


The Fifth Trial

by Capzi



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alpha Dean, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Beta Castiel, Body Modification, Dean just wants a freakin baby ok, Domestic, Established Castiel/Dean Winchester, Family Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Mpreg, Nephilim, Non-Explicit Sex, Omega Sam, Pregnant Sam, semi-graphic birth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-02
Updated: 2015-05-23
Packaged: 2018-03-28 17:55:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 33,679
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3864244
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Capzi/pseuds/Capzi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Winchesters are no strangers to sacrifice of the highest order, but the opportunity to bring home all the angels presents a unique set of challenges. Featuring Dean's unexpected hurt in his new relationship, Castiel's attempts to keep the peace, and Sam's bloated, sugar-craving, nauseous, mood-swinging desperation to just get through the next nine months, dammit.</p><p>Buck up, boys. We've got an abomination on the way.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Our story takes place after an alternative version of Season 9, in which Castiel still lead an angel rebellion against Metatron, but after his capture, Castiel's Grace is restored and he and Dean begin a relationship together. There is no MOC, and A/B/O dynamics apply to all humans.

         

* * *

 

       The chill of the window glass felt strangely comforting under Castiel’s fingertips. A grounding sensation, more reminiscent of cool water than the bite of steel, such as that of an abandoned school bus past midnight.

         In the front seat, after a brief debate on whether or not to stop for food, Dean and Sam had fallen silent. Castiel interpreted the quiet without thinking, reading their weariness and frustration in the air with no more trouble than watching their mortal souls wavering underneath their physical forms.

         He blinked, surprised and pleased by his own skills. There had a been a time (not at all long ago for a being such as himself) when he struggled to find the meaning of an expression, a split-second gesture, a flash of a scent; he an all-powerful presence hindered by his inability to grasp human emotion. It was much less often a challenge for him now, and he had several factors to thank: Time. His experiences as a human himself. A willingness to seek out and find and understand. And of course, his most important tie to humanity now.

         Dean. Castiel’s own mate, who at that moment, flickered his gaze from the road to the rearview mirror, catching Castiel leaving fingerprints on the glass of his other beloved. There was an amused grunt and roll of his eyes, which returned to the puddle of light illuminating the Impala’s way. Castiel took his hand from the window, smiling slightly, and set about entertaining himself through other means.

         He closed his eyes and breathed deeply, taking in all that he could through this, the most special and crucial of the humans’ senses.

         At present, the air was stuffy with the scent of farmland left too long to rot in the August sun. Old rope gone mildewy with seawater. Particles of sour dust. As in so many other areas, the brothers were perfectly synced.

         But Castiel focused harder, teasing out the nuances that distinguished them.

         Dean’s scent he understood better than any other in this form, the unique combination of warm fabric, steam from lava rocks, forest undergrowth, and a smell that felt more like a memory, something that spoke of ancient forms of life and campfires at dusk and battlefield blood. It was something that could not be expressed in any language.

         Castiel had not spent the same number of hours mapping out Sam’s scent, yet he could still read the inky-sawdust-iron-raw almond smell nearly as well as the looks of concern Sam reserved for his brother. It was an undeniably Alpha scent, more industrial than Dean but no less masculine and powerful.

         The car, their home in motion, was saturated with the two Winchesters, every inch infused with undertones of gunpowder and the rank, predatory musk of lions.

         It was an intimidating blend for the uninitiated, those outside their small pack, but Castiel settled back into the worn leather seat with ease. His place here was earned.

         And it wasn’t as if his own hands were free from blood.

         The silence continued to surround the pack as Dean guided them safely home, parking the Impala in the dimly lit concrete garage and opening the trunk for their duffels. Exhaustion made the brothers’ footsteps heavy and sluggish across the faded carpet leading to their respective bedrooms.

         Castiel went to the bunker’s scrubbed kitchen right away, hoping Dean and Sam would not have to regret their decision to go home without eating first. He dug through the pantry that held their small cache of cereals and canned goods and discovered several boxes of macaroni and cheese. Not the product in the vivid blue box Castiel saw advertised on television, but generic, colorless cardboard holding even more colorless noodles that clattered against the bottom of the pot.

        Castiel grimaced and covered the dusty macaroni with water. Far from an appealing dinner, but it would beat starvation. He opened one of the packets of neon orange cheese powder.

         Perhaps.

         He was examining the nutritional content on the back of the boxes (he should really be more vigilant about his mate’s sodium intake) when he became aware of a certain _spark_ in the air, like the first crackle of lightning. His placement of the sensation was instinctual, as was his instant relocation to its source.

         Reaching at once for his blade as he flew and found himself in the library, Castiel felt the fire coursing through his human form rise. His wings, which could not be truly seen nor felt in this plane, spread wide, feathers pulsing with liquid electricity.

        “And good evening to you as well, Castiel.”

         A low snarl sounded from the corner of the room, where Dean was poised to strike at the intruders, knife in hand. Likewise, Sam bore his own teeth and blade, long legs bent in a crouch next to the chair he’d obviously knocked over in his hurry to get upright.

        Castiel was relieved his humans were unharmed, but he knew too well that could change in an instant with angels involved.

        “What do you want, Alana. Seraphiel.”

         He knew them, of course. Castiel knew all his brothers and sisters, even if he was only well acquainted with a small number. The two standing before him, dressed in women wearing bland, grey suits, brought a nodding sense of recognition, but nothing more.

         The one with the bright-blue-star-shining-bear-cub form, Alana, spoke again and her vessel’s tongue rolled over and under with tones of her broad, True voice.

         “Fear not, Castiel. We have not come to harm you, nor the humans under your protection, but at the request of Heaven.”

          She paused briefly, the air beside her shimmering like heat over asphalt and Castiel knew she was unaccustomed to containing her form within a vessel, unused to the confinement of her wings in flesh-and-blood.

         “A solution for returning our brethren to Heaven has been proposed. A possible route to peace again among our ranks, at the cost of only a short period of…compliance from the Winchesters.”

        “Well, sweetheart, you must be new to the club, ‘cus we don’t take too well to memos from upstairs,” Dean barked, seething with the rage that dropped uncomfortable silences at crowded bars and forced information out of the most unwilling. The scent of black licorice mixed with wood smoke filled the air. 

        “Dean!” Sam fixed his brother with a tempering stare, then turned back to the other angels warily. Dean caught Castiel’s eye and frowned, but said no more.

         Castiel shared his dread and concern. He sensed that Alana spoke truthfully –that was, that she did believe in the message she delivered –yet he knew too well that a solution to overturning Metatron’s spell could not come easily. Nor could he imagine what part he could possibly be asked to play within such a solution, not after his recent demonstrations of allegiance.

        Sam lowered his knife slightly and addressed Alana himself, lemon-pepper-curiosity coloring his wariness.

        “That’s a pretty big claim, saying you’ve got a Band-aid to hold that mess together. Before we hear what kind of “compliance” you’ve got in mind for us, how about telling us who you even are?”

        “Impertinent, human.” Seraphiel’s vessel was smaller than any other body in the room, and her tinny voice was soft, but she spoke with cold, ancient power. It was with the knowledge of archangels, and Castiel gasped aloud as her True form finally broke a cord of recollection within his memory. Face beautiful, crowned with peonies and holly, body of a great eagle, and many, many times larger than he himself. His mouth filled up with a silent curse.

        “It seems that having Castiel at your beck and call has filled you with a false sense of security among the presence of angels, but you would do well to remember that our taking the time to _speak_ to you, like equals, is nothing more than a courtesy.”

        When Seraphiel halted her imposing speech to shake out her own wings, it was not only the space around her that vibrated, but the entire library. Dean’s eyes flashed with fear for a split second, before he tightened his grip on his blade and his face settled with grim determination.

        “Still, to further that courtesy, I will answer your question, Sam Winchester. My companion is Alana, guardian of motherhood and birth under my office.”

        Seraphiel raised her vessel’s small chin, a gesture that pushed her golden cheekbones to higher prominence, though neither Sam nor Dean could see it.

        “For I am Seraphiel: chief of the Seraphim, judge of angels, and protector of Metatron.”

        There was a sharp inhale of breath and dull clatter as Sam dropped his blade, but it was all but obscured by Dean’s howl of rage as he made to charge at the angels. Seraphiel raised a hand calmly and Dean was shoved back hard into the brick with the force of her Grace.

        Castiel tried to move, drawn to his mate’s grunt of pain, but found himself similarly pinned where he stood.

        “We’d _never!”_ Dean spit, struggling uselessly against his bonds. “ _Never_ work with the bastard protecting fuckin’ _Metatron!_ Although…” He managed a rueful smile. “Doesn’t seem like you’re gonna be up for a promotion any time soon, seeing as you went and let the boss-man get locked up.”

        Seraphiel spared him a grotesque approximation of disgust, revulsion curling her sculpted lips.

        “I will finish speaking now. You misunderstand, which I am certain is no uncommon occurrence. While I was charged with the protection of the holy scribe, I agree that imprisonment is the suitable punishment for his crimes. My highest obligation is to Heaven, even above the welfare of one angel, and so, fittingly, I also must answer for my part in his plot. Had I been keeping proper watch over Metatron, tracking his hideouts here on Earth, I would have known of his plans to expel us all from Heaven, and thus, I must sacrifice something of myself in our rebuilding.”

        “And what will that be?” Sam asked from his place near the up-turned chair, hands at his side. He moved and breathed easily, free from the bond of Seraphiel’s Grace, and Castiel wondered at this, feeling his unease build even further.

        It was Alana who answered, in a tone of such practiced obedience it neared boredom.

       “In the spellwork for our species-wide expulsion, which he alone can wield, Metatron called for –along with other items, including your Grace, Castiel –a Nephilim, slain. With the recovery of your Grace, along with the Cupid’s bow, the order of the Seraphim believe it possible to try to reverse the spell, finally drawing back all remaining angels to Heaven and restoring order to the chaotic divisions that have resulted from the Fall.”

       Castiel experienced a momentary fluttering of hope in his chest, which quickly dropped to the pits of his stomach.

       “You need to breed a Nephilim for the counterspell.”

       “Yes,” Seraphiel answered tartly. “I have elected to conceive it, in atonement for my mistakes.”

       “You…have to make a human-angel baby? That’s your punishment?” Sam looked so confused, Castiel _burned_ with sympathy for him.

       He tried to speak quickly, to enlighten him before Alana and Seraphiel decided they had enough of what he knew they must consider to be idle chatter.

       “Nephilim are abominations, Sam, monsters in the view of Heaven. To conceive one in the old days was a great disgrace among angels, and the stigma remains so strong that none currently exist on Earth. I must admit that when Dean and I were first mated, I was relieved to know we are not sexually compatible to create pups ourselves.”

       Castiel glanced back at Dean shamefully, guilt and remorse rolling through him at the hurt on his mate’s face. But there would be time to soothe Dean later. Castiel was only becoming more and more convinced that it was Sam who was in greatest danger at the moment.

       The younger Alpha turned his gaze from angel to Dean to Castiel to angel, growing visibly frustrated. His expression was the same as when he struggled to find some obscure piece of lore, late in the night after two days of no rest.

       “That still doesn’t explain what you two are doing here,” Sam gestured at the angels.

       His face turned aghast.

       “You don’t…. don’t expect me or Dean to, well, to _father_ it, do you?”

       Castiel shook his head before the others could answer.

       “Nephilim cannot be born of angels. Only of humans.”

       “You’re barking up the wrong tree, ladies,” Dean sang out, confident despite the traces of pain still etched around his eyes. “Winchesters are Alphas.”

       “Yes, and anyone with a _nose_ could sense that,” Seraphiel snapped back. “Castiel, your pets seem to appreciate subtlety like a hundred-years plague, so I will be blunt: as a vessel bred to hold Lucifer, greatest of us all, Sam has been selected as the best possible carrier for a Nephilim. It is a simple process, though by no means easy, for Alana to modify his form to appropriately conceive and nurture the child, and upon birth, we will return to accept it for what the order believes will be a completed counterspell.”

       Castiel was anticipating his mate’s outrage on his brother’s behalf, so he only half-heard Dean’s furious, ocean-wave-crash proclamation, “Son of a _bitch!_ You can’t just stuff him full of Omega parts and use him like a broodmare!”

       He focused his attentions instead on Sam, who seemed pale and smaller than usual under the blazing light of the angels. Seraphiel and Alana watched for his reaction as well, clearly expecting a verbal response.

       Sam seemed to ignore Dean’s outburst and instead stared straight back at the angels, frowning slightly.

       “If I say no, will you do it anyway?”

       “No,” Alana answered simply. “The process requires entry to your body and cannot be undertaken without your consent.”

       There was quiet while Sam folded his arms and leaned back against the heavy wood table in the center of the room, face lined with concentration.

       “You can change me for this…but you can change me back, afterwards?”

       “Yes.”

       “Will I be responsible for…it after you’re done with the spell? Assuming it even survives?”

       “No.”

       “Will _I_ survive, having it inside me? It won’t hurt me?”

       “There is no reason to believe otherwise.”

       “Right.” Sam wet his lips and crossed his arms the other way. “And this is the best plan anyone’s got, for getting Heaven back together?”

       “Sammy, no,” Dean moaned, fists clenching and unclenching from where he was held.

       “My Seraphs are the highest order of angels, Sam, as well as the oldest, with the collective wisdom of millennia,” Seraphiel strode closer, tiny feet making almost no noise on the carpet. “And I know myself to be a good, righteous, if somewhat desperate leader and judge. We all must contribute what we can to right the wrongs that have been done, I making a part of myself mortal and unbuttoning my…dignity, you surrendering your body, while your brother and Castiel watch over you these coming months. Past sins _must_ be atoned for.”

   Castiel felt one of his wings twitch and kept his gaze fixed on Sam’s face. There was silence for a few more beats before Sam straightened his tall frame and let his arms fall free.

       “I’ll do it.”

       “Sam!” Dean cried out, but already Alana was moving to place a hand flat against Sam’s forehead, her Grace flowing from her in molten blue and silver.

       It was difficult for Castiel to decipher the Enochian she chanted, which was rich with age and complexity. He felt, rather than heard the commands for change, for flesh to grow and pulse and burn. Having examined Sam at an atomic, spirit-level himself, he was relieved to see the pains Alana took to work with care, creating and growing from Sam while preserving all she could. Even still, the process took only a few minutes at most.

       Seraphiel stepped forward then and Alana reached back to clasp the hand she offered. Alana dropped her touch from Sam’s head to his abdomen and the living chain of three glowed and pulsed brighter than before, urging Sam’s body to do as no angel could and create anew.

       The connection broke with a faint sizzle and all three members of the Winchester pack slumped to the ground; Castiel and Dean with Seraphiel’s bonds having broken, Sam with the force of the transformation he’d just endured.

       “SAMMY!”

       Dean tripped and stumbled as he propelled himself to his brother. Castiel knelt beside the two and placed a hand to Sam’s throat, feeling for a pulse. It was a bit faster than usual, no doubt his heart accustoming itself to flowing in new areas, but Sam was unconscious. Dean shook at his shoulders, calling his name a few more times, before whirling around to face the angels.

       “Spineless sonsabitches, you said it wouldn’t hurt him!” Dean’s eyes glinted dangerously and the burnt licorice smell intensified. “The fuck do you call _this?!”_

       Seraphiel seemed no more concerned than if she’d just poured a cup of coffee, and Castiel felt a streak of now-familiar irritation at his kind’s disregard for the fragility of humans.

       “Sam’s body has been reshaped into an entirely new form, as well as coerced into accepting a Seraph’s Grace to create a new life. Let him rest and recover. Your brother _will_ be well throughout his pregnancy.”

       “We should leave now,” Alana put in, eyes on Sam’s motionless form. “You should have no further need of us, unless difficulty arises. Castiel will know if any part of the child’s development is amiss.”

       Castiel felt his wing twitch again and looked up to inquire about this supposed ability only to find the Seraphs had vanished with a rustle of feathers.

       Dean rolled his head back with a bitten-off curse before clutching at Castiel’s wrist with one hand, his other still holding tight on Sam’s shoulder. The air was sharp with the marathon sweat and sunbleached bones smell of fear for his brother.

       “Why d’we always get the weird shit, Cas? Never just bedbugs or runnin’ out of gas, is it, babe?” Dean’s grip was warm and strong, but Castiel could feel the slight shaking of his hand.

       “He’ll be fine, Dean. The angels…need him safe and whole.”

       Dean snorted, a desperate, painful sound.

       “ ‘S’long as he’s in good enough shape to incubate their monster, I guess.”

       Castiel was about to respond (an affirmation would be the truthful route, if his love for Dean were not so great) when Dean suddenly lifted his head to sniff at the air with his keen Alpha nose.

       “Something burning?”

       “Oh! Yes. I was, um, cooking macaroni and cheese.” Castiel locked eyes with his mate guiltily, until he felt Dean’s gaze warm with reluctant amusement.

       “Right. Okay.” Dean hooked an arm under Sam’s shoulder and started to rise, cueing Castiel to assist him. “Let’s tally up today: there’s a freshly-turned vamp on the loose we couldn’t bring in, Sam got knocked up, we’re totally out of clean socks, and we probably don’t have more than half a box of Raisin Bran and burnt mac and cheese to round out the evening.”

       “Sam ate the Raisin Bran this morning,” Castiel reminded his mate, trying to be helpful.

       Dean only grunted in response.

* * *

 

       Dean raised his arms above his head, letting loose a yawn as he stretched. The incredible _wrongness_ of the air hit him and he shook his head, trying to rid his nose of the irritating scent.

       He knew what his brother smelled like – _books tools health food store_ – knew that smell better than he knew any in the whole world (Cas’ scent just wasn’t as pervasive, as defining as a human’s), and even though it wasn’t really gone, it was like it was muted somehow, like the lights had been dimmed. It was seriously freaking him out.

       And then, the truly scary part. Ever since Sam laid down to “rest and recover,” the bunker had been filling with a scent totally foreign and unbelievable: the mellow notes of pregnant Omega. When Dean closed his eyes, he could almost pretend he’d just walked by a woman or man on the street with a big belly and slow pace.

       But the smell wasn’t coming from a stranger. The cocktail of clean grass and warm fur and fuckin’ fresh-baked blueberry muffins was what the angels had turned Sam into. His baby brother, a sacred vessel not for the devil but for a Nephilim, a creature so revolting to angel-kind his own mate was _relieved_ they couldn’t have pups of their own.

       Like he’d heard himself churning in Dean’s mind (hell, maybe he had), Cas padded into the kitchen, wafting _cinnamon honey oaky rain_ to announce his presence before Dean even noticed his footsteps.

       “Maybe they conveniently forgot to mention Sam’d be unconscious for the whole thing.”

       Cas dropped to a stool opposite at the low wood table and studied Dean’s closed laptop, head tilted.

       “I don’t think so. He wanted to eat and urinate during the brief period he was awake yesterday. It seems that his body is just adjusting to its new state.”

       “Mmm. Right.” Dean breathed deeply, ignoring the Omega-scented air to focus on steeling himself for the can of worms he was about to open up. “So. Cas?”

       “Yes, Dean.”

       “Y’know, you could have told me sometime _before_ now if the thought of having a kid with me was so horrible.”

        Cas’ eyes went wide as his face took on that kicked-puppy expression he got whenever he’d let Dean down. Dean recognized that look well, had to know all Cas’ many moods from just his face, when his scent only changed minutely in response to his emotions. At the moment though, the sour tang of guilt was enough to cover the sweetness of the bunker.

       But not for long. Cas had only gotten as far as opening his mouth to start a “Dean, I-” when the smell increased a hundredfold and the source appeared in the doorway, stumbling and rubbing his eyes.

       Sam may have smelled like a garden party, but he looked like shit. Hair all tangled up and greasy. Drool-trail at the corner of his mouth. Eyes puffy. The weird thing though was how he carried himself. He walked almost as if he’d taken one too many hits to the back: lower to the ground, knees bent, like he wasn’t sure whether the next step would bring him pain.

       Dean was on him in a flash, taking shoulders in his hands that felt smaller than before, daring to feel thankful for just a moment.

       “Sam! Man, is it good to see you up, little brother.”

       Sam managed a smile, accepted the hug Dean wrapped him up in, and broke free to settle on Dean’s stool, lowering himself with the same carefulness.

       “How are you feeling?” Cas asked, stowing away all traces of his own emotion and avoiding Dean’s eye. To be continued, then.

       “Exhausted.” Despite the crappiness of his appearance and the newness of his scent, Sam sounded exactly like himself, a tiny thing for Dean to take comfort in. “How long’ve I been out?”

       “Two days. You were up a little while yesterday when I was grabbing a shower, Cas helped you pee and eat half a Pop-Tart before you went down again.”

       Sam tossed back his shaggy head and sighed.

       “I don’t remember. When they…changed me, it was like being hit with lightning, everything just seemed to hurt and vibrate, and then I was waking up a few minutes ago. It doesn’t hurt anymore and the vibrating is slowing down, but it’s still there. It’s weird. Dizzy-feeling. Like, I could shake and break apart into a million pieces.”

       There was quiet for a beat before Dean decided it was time to get to the guts of this thing.

       “Sam, why’d you do it? You let two angels we don’t even know zap you into a cupcake-scented Omega and stick you with a _baby_ , and for what? The chance that maybe making another Nephilim will suck the rest of the angels back up top and they’ll go all kumbaya with each other now? We had no reason to trust them, or this plan, and you dive in headfirst, saddling yourself with this, this _thing_ for nine months!”

       Cas frowned but Sam just sighed again and looked at Dean in a world-weary kind of way, giving off no trace of anger or regret or even annoyance. Dean felt his grip on the edge of the table clench against his will. Sam’s lack of response was making him uncomfortable. It was weird, unexpected, alarming. It wasn’t Alpha at all.

       “Dean, the thing is, it’s not a bad plan. It might even be a really good plan, it makes a lot of intuitive sense. Reversing the spell by gathering up the components taken in it would be the simplest way.”

       “Then wouldn’t they need the Nephilim who was killed in the first place? Why don’t they just drag her out again?”

       “The Nephilim I killed is almost certainly in Purgatory,” Cas put in quietly. “Although I myself proved to be the exception, the Seraphs and the other angels cannot escape there even if they were to find and rescue her.”

       “Exactly! They can’t get the original one, so they’re taking a leap here assuming another one will work in the counterspell. There’s no reason to believe it’ll work!”

       “Well, there’s no reason to believe it won’t. Maybe just the creation of a new life counters the taking of another, and Seraphiel will pop back up today to say it’s done and we can all move on with our lives knowing the angels are all back where they’re supposed to be, hopefully figuring out how to set up some kind of elected democracy in Heaven. Look, I already agreed to this and it’s already happening, okay? If it doesn’t work, what’s a few months of retaining water and getting too fat to see my feet? It already beats _hell_ , that’s for sure. And if it does work, it’ll be worth it to help restore balance to what Metatron’s done to the world.”

       “He’s right, Dean.” Cas looked at him now, jaw set with determination. “As long as there is a chance that this can bring the angels back home, Sam’s decision is a choice worth protecting. Besides.”

       Those baby blues dropped for a minute before coming back to gaze at Dean, all liquid with regret again.

       “Culpability for much of the Fall and its casualties lies with me, including the death of the only Nephilim in existence for millennia. Now I have a chance to redeem myself in some way, by watching over this new life.”

       Cas looked so beautiful in those moments, when he was stupid with bravery and willing to burn himself up for a few seconds of sunshine for someone else, that Dean felt his heart kind of ache with the enormity of whatever it was they had together. He didn’t understand how he could be constantly surprised by someone and yet still feel like they’d always known and belonged to each other all their lives.

       Dean pressed his palms flat into the table and dropped his head for a beat before the weight of everything collapsed in. As the years passed by, some items got taken off his own personal list of Rules (‘No Chick Music’ had been off for years, while ‘No Fantasizing about Sucking Dick’ hung on ‘til, well, exactly how long had he and Cas been mated now?) and some new ones got tacked on. ‘If Sam and Cas Agree, It’s Worth Looking into’ was at the very top, and so he let himself exhale his doubts for the moment, relenting.

       “Okay, fine. Operation Angel Baby is a go. So what now?”

       Sam just shrugged.

       “Now nothing. We keep on keeping on, doing what we always do, and I adjust to life without knot.”

       Dean whipped his head up, horror bubbling up anew.

       “They took your knot?!”

       “They redid my _whole setup_ , trust me, losing my knot is the least weird part of all this,” Sam muttered darkly, staring at his own hands on the tabletop.

       Dean immediately decided he really, really did not want to know. Sammy was okay. That was the important thing, always. They’d deal with the shit once it actually hit the fan, same as they ever did.

       Despite himself, he found his eye wandering to Sam’s stomach, wondering at the thing brewing inside. Half-angel, half-human. Should be the best of both worlds, honestly. Not a punishment. Not a tool. Not a threat.

       Suddenly restless, Dean surprised himself by straightening up and pulling his keys from his pocket.

       “Well, you’re not going to feed a pup on MREs and Pop-tarts, not on my watch. I’m makin’ a grocery run.”

       Cas made to stand, like wanted to stop him or join him, but Dean waved his mate off.

       “You stay. Look after him.”

       “So having a baby means I need a babysitter?” Sam asked dryly. “I’m fine, Dean, I don’t think a floating clump of cells can do much damage, even if it is an affront to nature.”

       “You get your breed status changed by angels, you take a few days off, it’s all in the Hunters’ handbook,” Dean called over his shoulder as he strode from the kitchen, hoping he sounded more authoritative than he felt at the moment.

        The Omega-scent faded and then grew stronger again as he passed Sam’s room, on the way to the garage, before being drowned out entirely by the reassuring smell of motor oil. He steered Baby out into the sunshine, grateful for the quiet and the even greater reassurance of Sam’s scent-mark on the leather. It would fade eventually, but for now, he could have a few minutes of imagining nothing had changed.

        It was late afternoon by now and the supermarket parking lot was crowded with people doing after-work grocery shopping. Dean found a cart and joined the throng, pulling food off the shelves absentmindedly.

       Maybe it was just because the store was so busy or maybe it wasn’t, but the vast quantity and diversity of scents felt overwhelming. A silky female Omega pushed a cart with her female Alpha, the two of them arguing over cereal. Beta college kids gawked and blocked traffic in front of the beer. Grouchy, newly-presented teenagers followed their mothers.

       And by the meat counter, Dean was looking at cuts of steak when he caught a whiff of smoky, musky, dominant Alpha. He looked up instinctively, hormones still telling him to seek out this potential threat even when he couldn’t care less about comparing weapons, and found himself eye-to-eye with a man as tall as he was, thick in the neck and jaw, with steely ‘fuck off’ eyes…and a young pup strapped to his chest. Another kid, a toddler, bounced up and down in the cart full of baby things.

       Dean let his gaze linger on the neat stacks of diapers and formula and his nose take in the sweet, milky scent of the newborn. His heart seemed to swell and pound, swirling with a raw, aching feeling of _unfair_.

       The other Alpha noticed Dean and gave a lazy nod of recognition before steering his pack up to the counter to ask for pork chops.

       Dean blinked, dragging himself back into the moment. Shopping. Right. Should get some of that kale crap for Sam, and maybe bread for sandwiches, if they were going to be cooped up a while. Might be worth it to spring for the organic lunch meat, what with Cas giving him crap lately about eating salt and shit. Hadn’t even cracked a smile when Dean joked it helped keep the demons away, and so he was probably serious anyway.

       He was halfway back home, front seat loaded with plastic bags, before Dean abruptly remembered that Omegas –especially _pregnant_ Omegas –probably weren’t allowed to do field work for the FBI. Or the CIA or FEMA or the MIB or whatever fake badge-ery their work required for the week.

       The pharmacy in Lebanon, Kansas was one of those quiet, mom-and-pop affairs, dependent more on social ties to the owners than prescriptions. Not that he needed either to get what he came for: scent-masking deodorant spray. The cheaper, herbal based stuff stood in rows on the shelf, just like in any other pharmacy in the whole world, but the chemical sprays were locked up behind the counter, mostly to keep them away from greedy Omega and Beta kids.

       Dean marched straight up to that counter and slapped down his cash.

       “I need scent-masking. Beta and Alpha, best quality you’ve got.”

       The old woman perched on a stool in front of the glass, hands full of wool work, looked up sharply. Her eyes bounced from Dean to the wad on the counter, lips pursed, clearly trying to work out if the money was worth selling such valuable goods to a crass Alpha.

       It must have been, because the woman finally stood, unlocked the display, and handed over the glossy boxes with a neutral, “Here you are. Good night, then,” before returning to her knitting, carefully sliding the cash into a skirt pocket.

       Satisfied, Dean resumed the trip home. _Home,_ where his pack waited, the three of them fearless and tough and ready to save the world, almost always through really fucking stupid means.

       He stopped for a red light and skimmed the back of one of the packages.

_Show your **TRUE ALPHA SELF** to the world! Advanced scent-masking technology elevates natural levels of your own inner Alpha to create a **UNIQUE and POWERFUL** blend that tells everyone in your path you are here to **DOMINATE**!_

       Dean groaned out loud.

       Really fucking stupid.

* * *

 

       It was strange and amazing and discomforting all at once that he could wake up some days now and accept this as normal. But then, Sam tried not to think too much about that.

       He tried not to think too much about any facet of what life had become, just went through these past two weeks day to day, resting and exploring the bunker and idly searching online for weirdness. It could almost be any other slow week, if he forced himself to not notice the changes that had already taken place.

       Like how Dean treated him now, like something dangerous but delicate. It was demon blood all over again, Lucifer all over again, Trials all over again, with his brother circling constantly, afraid to leave him alone too long. Dean never could just trust that he wasn’t going to break.

       Except sometimes he _did_ feel like he was under the influence of something bigger than himself, something powerful and unstoppable, bent on destroying him from the inside. He was tired, no matter how long he slept. Food no longer seemed appealing. It was like coming down with a bad flu, if he didn’t factor in the vibrating.

       That, he couldn’t ignore. It was very faint now, akin to the feel of the Impala’s hood cooling after a short drive, and seemed to come from, well, where he guessed his _uterus_ probably was. He couldn’t find any mention of it on any of the pregnancy blogs he now kept on his reading list, and Cas could offer no clear-cut explanation.

       “An afterglow of creation,” he said. “A calming of the massive energy that was required in conception.”

       Sam guessed it was possible he was just more sensitive to things now. His sense of smell, in particular, had changed dramatically. Whereas before he had never noticed the scent of the bunker, except to register his and Dean’s combined scent-marks as home, now he found himself sometimes overwhelmed by the potency of Alpha in the air. Dean still smelled like Dean – which was to say, a jumbled but powerful blend of damp firewood warming old blankets, rain on a cold Oregon beach, and dust kicked up in a ghost town – but now Sam was more aware of the wavy undercurrents that also characterized him. Hints of things like fresh blood and the oily handle of a used pistol.

       He recognized parts of these dark undertones actually belonged to him, who he was two weeks ago, and tried not to think of that either.

       To distract himself, Sam stretched out on his bed, rolling over to his back, and thought about the not-so-subtle physical changes that had taken place.

       He knew he didn’t look much different, but his body felt softer somehow. His muscles, though unchanged in appearance, seemed slack, useless. At the same time, he felt heavier, no doubt due to the additional organ in his body and the increased blood supply to it.

       He let his eyes fall shut again as he ran his hands over the more supple skin of his stomach. He moved them further south and grimaced involuntarily.

       His knot was gone, and his cock felt so much smaller, less significant without it. Also, his cock was placed slightly higher now, which was weird in and of itself, to make room for the small, strange line between his balls and his ass. A birthing slit. He’d never actually seen one before (having no occasion to get close and personal with Omega men), and now he could run a finger gently over the tight mark that didn’t yield or respond to his touch in any way. It was difficult –and more than slightly terrifying –to imagine anything coming out of himself here, and so he set that thought to the side too.

       And then there was his ass.

       Sam had never given much thought at all to his hole in a sexual state of mind, with almost two decades of having a knot and wanting only to find other holes to fill mark claim. But now it seemed to have a mind of its own. In moments of pleasure, whether in the shower or after waking or even (to his horror) when watching something racy on TV with Dean and Cas, he could feel it twitch and warm with a small amount of silky liquid.

       He was producing slick. He was a sweet-smelling Omega, growing soft with pregnancy, and now his body was yearning for a knot it didn’t even need.

       Thankfully, the sensations always went away quickly, before, it seemed, Dean could even pick up on the flicker of scent in the air.

       A glance at his watch had Sam forcing himself upright in bed and scooting over to the edge, feet resting on the cold floor. Despite the usual exhaustion, he couldn’t help but feel a little bit excited to finally be getting out of the bunker. He’d pulled up a case too local and open-shut for Dean to shoot down the night before, some kind of haunting in Jewell. Diving back into the game felt like the natural thing to do; two weeks of sitting around on his ass was more than enough.

       Or so it seemed, right up until Sam finally got to his feet and promptly threw up last night’s tacos into the wastebasket.

 

       “You alright, man?”

       Sam just groaned and waved away his brother’s would-be casual tone. The Impala was cold from sitting in the garage, and the chilled leather and glass felt soothing on his face. His stomach hadn’t stopped rolling since he’d gotten out of bed. Speaking seemed like too much effort (and risk) and he felt irritated, hot, inside his suit. An unpleasant chemical odor circled the air, courtesy of the deodorant spray Dean had bought to mask his new Omega scent. The package had said that dousing his armpits and neck with the stuff would tell the world he was an Alpha, for up to six hours, but Sam couldn’t imagine it fooling anyone. He smelled too aggressively _loud_ , too strongly of generic Alpha trademarks like cooked meat, animal musk, sea salt, for the effect to be natural.

       At the same time, he knew the spray had to be over-the-top to be effective at all. In a few months, maybe even weeks, his pregnancy scent would clash outrageously with the chemical Alpha and render it useless. Hopefully there would be time to use the less-distinctive, milder smelling Beta spray and pass with that for a while, but Sam recognized now that there was far from a guarantee he’d be able to keep actively working cases. A pregnant male Omega doing FBI fieldwork was more than unusual: it was unheard of. Their little pack couldn’t afford to stand out, not with their way of life.

       “Maybe this isn’t a good idea.”

       With his eyes closed and the angel’s emotions as difficult to scent as ever, even with his new nose, Sam could still hear the worried frown in Cas’ voice.

       “ ‘s fine, let’s just go,” he mumbled, wondering if the familiarity of riding in the car would be enough to lull him into a quick nap.

       Dean started the engine and pulled out of the garage onto the drive and then the main road silently. The quiet was too good to last.

       “Look, Sam, you need a time-out today, you just pull out, okay? Me’n Cas can handle this, you don’t have to go straining yourself to prove-”

       “I can do my job, Dean!” The motion of the road was doing nothing for Sam’s nausea, and the dry, salty aroma of his brother’s concern only annoyed him more. The Alpha spray just soured in response to his outburst, tainting the air with the smell of burned steak.

       “Course you can.” Dean tapped at the steering wheel uneasily and glanced in the rearview mirror at Cas. “I’m just saying, if you get to feeling bad, you can always-”

       “Dean, pull over.”

       “Hey, dial it back a notch, drama queen, I’ll shut up, okay?”

       “DEAN. _Pull over or I’m going to puke in your car.”_

       The Impala’s brakes screeched to a grinding halt that had Dean biting off curses, but Sam couldn’t care about anything other than getting the door open before he lost the contents of his stomach for a second time. He leaned out of the car for a minute longer, catching his breath, and slumped back inside, feeling furious but totally wiped.

       Dean granted him about five precious minutes of fuming before turning into an asshole again.

       “Like I was saying. You can always let the kid win this one.”

 

       The Jewell county coroner’s office was tiny and cramped and airless and Sam hated it. The coroner herself was politely accommodating, but Sam hated her too. He hated her sterile, neutral scent and the almost freakish thoroughness with which she relayed information about the victim’s wounds. To be completely fair, at the moment he hated everyone, living or dead, in the whole little room.

       He hated Dean for being right, and Cas for being kind, offering soft, steadying touches at his shoulder. He hated the vic for existing. Most of all, he hated himself for dragging them out here, when he could be at home, moaning complaints in bed instead of moaning complaints inside his own head.

       “Were any pieces of jewelry recovered from the body, maybe an old locket or ring?” Dean was in his element, as always, looking healthy and confident. A dominant Alpha, hard at work. It struck Sam as incredibly gross right then.

       “Yes, actually.” The coroner pulled an intricate leather bracelet from the bag of personal effects and handed it over. “It belonged to her sister, originally.”

       Dean hid a smile as he turned to show Sam and Cas. Some wheedling and a toothy thank-you later, they were outside in the grey sunlight, bracelet in hand.

       “Sister’s buried in the town cemetery, barely a year ago. Man, if they were all this easy, we could retire in Florida, get Cas a nice tan,” Dean trumpeted, heading back to the car.

       “We’ll need the cover of nightfall to dig up the body,” Cas reminded him. “That may prove to be more of a…problem, than it once was.” Subtlety never really was Cas’ strong suit, and he glanced at Sam as he spoke and settled in the back seat again.

       Sam physically restrained himself from rolling his eyes with his finger and thumb pressed to his eyelids.

       “So we’ll wait it out, same as always. We’re already here aren’t we? Drive, Dean, anywhere.”

       A quick note of salty dryness again, but Dean complied.

       Unfortunately, his idea of waiting out the day involved a leisurely lunch at Biggerson’s. Sam was quietly gagging over the smell of grease and picking at his slimy salad when he noticed their waitress staring at him from the register station, confusion etched over her face.

       He looked himself over, then caught a whiff of fresh-baked goods too sweet to have come from the kitchen here.

 _Crap_.

       “Let me out,” he whispered to Dean, who had him boxed into their corner booth, fully occupied with putting away a burger the size of his head. “I smell like Omega, the spray’s worn off.”

       Dean’s eyes went wide as he dropped the burger and handed over the keys, practically jumping from the bench.

       “Fuck. Here, go.”

       Sam had managed to plow through the parking lot without anyone noticing, get to the Impala, spray himself all over, and was just making his way back to the restaurant when he ran into Dean and Cas coming the same way.

       Dean just shook his head and led them back to the car.

       “She had all the wait staff and the manager going, gossiping in the back. You really were full-on frou-frou, Sam. Best that we just move on.”

       A pit settled in the bottom of Sam’s stomach that had nothing to do with his voiding of it. He felt dirty now, contaminated, inside his Fed suit. It didn’t seem fair that he’d have to pretend to be something he’d always been, something he _was_ , at the core of his being, and be punished when he didn’t convince people. As the road took them to the outer skirts of town, he told himself he knew his reasons for pretending were good, for the greater good of everyone in the world, human and angel. But the world seemed a lot smaller suddenly.

 

       They spent the rest of the day at a community park with a big, messy duck pond and a lot of brown grass, killed by the fall frost. Periodically, Cas would wander off to watch the ducks (“Their social structure is much less complex than bees; I’ve almost mastered it”) and Sam and Dean would be left alone on a decaying wooden bench uphill to sit and wait for fleeting conversation topics. They’d already exhausted flashlight duty for the night’s dig and which closet the Men of Letters kept the spare linens in when Dean sighed and leaned forward to rest his elbows on his knees.

       “So,” he started, licking his lips and staring determinedly at his mate. Cas had vanished for a few seconds and reappeared with a bag of white bread, which he began ripping up and placing carefully around the pond. “You good now?”

       Sam mirrored his brother’s pose and looked down at his interlocked hands.

       “I don’t know. Sometimes I forget it’s even happening. But then today comes along and it’s like I can’t ignore it anymore and I’m just hit with this feeling of _What the hell was I thinking?_ I mean, I still want to go through with it. Not that I have any choice, probably. It’s just starting to feel more real now. The sacrifice part.”

       Dean looked him over sharply, eyes bright with a glimmer of emotion, an indistinct hint of citrus and pine coloring the air. Then he let himself slide into an easy smile, breathing a huff of laughter as he turned back to Cas, who was being stalked by a handful of the greediest ducks.

       “Hey, I was just talking about your gut, I didn’t sign up to _sacrifice_ my Baby’s interior.” Dean stood then, and called down to Cas, “Babe! Let’s go!” before nodding at Sam.

        “C’mon. Sun’s almost down; we got time for a cup of coffee or something.”

        Sam got to his feet reluctantly. The thought of hanging around some other junky diner was far from tempting, but he felt a little better, getting his thoughts outside his own head.

       He couldn’t quite stop himself from wondering at Dean’s reaction though, at that strange flash of…longing? Or was it despair? He just knew he’d never scented anything like it on his brother before.

      Cas caught up as they hiked back to the car, bringing a little parade of ducks that shrieked at the indignity of his leaving. Sam watched as he waved a hand over the flock and every single bird took off in flight, darkening the sky with the chaotic cadence of wings and feathers and reproachful quacking.


	2. Chapter 2

* * *

 

           Castiel gasped at the electricity biting down his spine and thrust his hips back hard. Dean answered with a push of sweaty skin, a scrape of stubble, a deeper twist of that raw, aching, primal pleasure.

            These moments were a paradox for Castiel, though he was only able to process such feelings after the moment had passed and he could hold onto a coherent thought again. When he and Dean were connected as intimately as they could be, and his Grace was curling and demanding to break out and be _inside_ Dean, even as Dean was inside him, he felt his most pure, more strongly in tune with the love vibrating across the universe than ever before. It was almost like being in Heaven again, in the earliest days when he knew only of love and devotion and to give, to serve. He gave and served in these moments too, worshipping the divine angles of Dean’s body, just as he took and demanded and received.

            At the same time, the hot drive and pull of their bodies against one another made him feel anything but angelic. Dean’s teeth on his shoulder and the weight of his chest on Castiel’s back were too sinfully good. Dean’s warm panting drowned out the heavenly chorus, his fingernails cut new protective sigils, and his climax was more glorious than the ecstasy of the first creation. Castiel surrendered himself to the blasphemous thought as easily as he allowed his own orgasm to crash and shiver across his body, leaving him in a state of rapturous contentment.

            Castiel is not always able to take Dean’s knot. There are times when his mate’s gentle coaxing is not enough to overcome the limitations of his body and they are forced to express their passion in other ways. Castiel doesn’t much mind when this is the case –and suspects Dean doesn’t either, as long as he is still free to roam Castiel’s body with tongue and teeth and fingertips –but he can admit there is a special joy in having Dean surround him so entirely. Strong arms on his chest, legs tangled up together, plush lips pressed to the soft skin at the back of his neck.

            The sheets and pillows were infused now with the scent of their lovemaking: fluids of various types, to be sure, but primarily of the breezy, wheat-stalk and fresh earth aroma coming off Dean in waves. His satisfaction intensified Castiel’s own, making him feel sleepy and carefree. Knowing his feelings could be understood in terms of simple chemical reactions, a biological response to his Alpha’s hormones, did nothing to diminish them. It never did.

            The lips on Castiel’s neck moved slowly, seeking out the juncture where it met his shoulder once again. Dean nibbled there tenderly, swiping heated skin with his tongue, then bit down hard.

            Castiel gave a small, involuntary shudder. The bite sent another jolt of pleasure down his body, followed quickly by a flutter of melancholy. Even when he began to feel the sting of teeth as pain, he allowed Dean to stay as he was, not daring to move. And when Dean removed his mouth a minute later and sighed, forehead pressed between Castiel’s shoulder blades, he felt for one of the hands wrapped around his chest and entwined their fingers.

            There was no need for a physical mark of their relationship. An Alpha marking a Beta mate was seen as excessive in many circles of modern society anyway, Castiel knew. And yet, he hadn’t hesitated when Dean had asked if he could place a mating claim, those few months ago. Dean was so beautiful in that moment, all smiles and ripe-strawberry eagerness.

           But Castiel had healed, that time and each time after, his Grace seeping out against his will to erase the dark blue bruise. 

           He breathed deeply, savoring his beloved’s scent and the impressions left by his body, letting himself soak up the feeling of belonging.

           Some time later, Dean’s knot returned to its normal size and they were free to slide apart, careful and wincing slightly. Dean rolled to his back and immediately reached out to drag Castiel over to him, curling him up to his chest like something precious.

            “Whataya know, Cas.”

            Castiel considered his answer for a moment, taking into account Dean’s drowsy tone and the slight lessening of the concern etched around his eyes from an uneventful few weeks at home.

            “Dean, I…”

 _I, what_ , he wondered, suddenly insecure _. I’m sorry? I’ve tried to give you everything I have and I know it’s still not enough? I regret hurting you even though I was being truthful? I love you more than I ever thought could be possible? I would gladly bear your pups now, if only I could?_

           “I wish you could mark me as yours.”

           Dean tensed suddenly, his hand tight on Castiel’s hip, before he relaxed and pressed a kiss to his sweat-slick temple.

          “Me too, babe.” He sighed again, voice soft. “But I can’t.”

           Castiel often left the warm embrace of Dean’s arms after his mate had fallen asleep, staying long enough to see his open, comfortable expression before relocating to the couch near the bed to read or meditate. This night, he chose to stay. He turned over on Dean’s chest once his breathing had become slow and even, feeling the heartbeat under his cheek. Counting the freckles on Dean’s jaw. Tracing Enochian that had no translation on the pillow near his ear, hoping that somehow the words would drift inside Dean’s consciousness and make him understand.

 

           Early the next morning, Castiel was on his way to the kitchen to start a pot of coffee when he found Sam working in the library. The younger Winchester had fallen into the habit of sleeping late, when his nausea permitted, and so Castiel was surprised to see him, and slightly concerned as he dragged out a chair to join him at the table.

           Sam jerked his head upright at the noise and nearly dropped his book to the floor, obviously startled.

          “Cas!”

          “Apologies. I didn’t mean to sneak up on you.” Sam closed the book, which seemed to be an old manual of Celtic spells, and rubbed at his eyes, nodding. “Are you alright?”

          “Couldn’t sleep. I’ve been hanging over the toilet since three-thirty.”

          Sam made a deeply miserable face and reached down to clutch at his stomach. The scent of rancid nuts and wet rags briefly cut across his syrupy Omega-smell. Castiel found he still was not quite used to the change. Nor were the brothers, if Dean’s quick lip-curls and Sam’s embarrassed flushes were anything to go off of, during times when the scent seemed especially potent.

          Castiel propped a hand under his chin and studied Sam.

          Alana’s handiwork was becoming more visible. Though unchanged in size and physique, Sam no longer resembled an Alpha. His face was paler, his brow and jaw seemed less heavy. Without the Alpha musk to back them up, his arm and back muscles were less threatening. And although his plaid flannel shirt hung over his body the same way it always had, Castiel could see the softness at his belly where Sam pressed his hand, and knew he must be able to feel the curve forming there.

          “Maybe you should go to see a doctor.”

          Sam huffed a breath of laughter.

          “Yeah, like _that_ ’ll go over well. ‘Ok, you’ve been pregnant for ten weeks? When was the date of your last heat? How long were you and your Alpha knotted and where is he now?’ I’m fine, Cas, my stomach’s always been shaky, so it’s not like it’s any big surprise. I just hope it’s not messing with the kid.”

          Castiel thought about this for a moment more, remembering the day of the conception.

          “Alana said I would be able to tell if anything were wrong in the child’s development,” he started slowly. “But I don’t know how.”

          Sam raised himself upright in his chair and stared at Castiel intently.

          “Can you…. _see_ it? Or sense it, that is, the way you do other angels?”

          “No,” Castiel answered, but he frowned. He was watching Sam’s hand on his stomach again, and reached out to that spot suddenly, with the power of his Grace.

          At first, he could feel nothing but Sam but he pressed harder, inching his hand closer until it was flat against the blue and green plaid. As soon as he’d touched the curve for himself, Sam gasped and dropped his own hand and Castiel felt, for the barest moment, a surge of answering Grace. It was faint and minute, almost small enough to be written off as the aftereffects of Sam’s transformation, yet Castiel knew what he was feeling was a whole, real, tiny life. Far from monstrous, it seemed so radiantly pure.

          He fell back in his seat, feeling awed. Sam was wide-eyed, his mouth hanging open.

          “That was it, wasn’t it? You felt it? It’s really there?”

          “Yes.” Despite his millennia of existence and experience, Castiel found himself quite overwhelmed. “The fetus is perfectly healthy. It has Grace. And a beating heart. And limbs, Sam, arms and legs already formed. Fingers.”

          He was babbling, he knew, but Sam didn’t seem to mind. On the contrary, at Castiel’s words, his face crumpled up in a look of repressed joy. For a moment, his eyes looked dewy and there was a fast whiff of rain on flower petals.

          “I’m glad, Cas. Thank you,” Sam murmured, his throat sounding tight.

          “What’re you two doing?”

          Dean had wandered into the room, bare-foot and still in his robe. He dropped into a chair beside Castiel and looked from his mate to his brother, yawning.

          Sam scrubbed at his face with his hands and cleared his throat. His eyes were clear now, his scent neutral.

          “Cas was checking up on the baby, which is apparently a thing he can do, with his Grace.”

          “It’s healthy,” Castiel added.

          Dean nodded, an odd, awkward expression on his face. When he spoke, his voice sounded too hearty, a little too devil-may-care, for Castiel to believe this information was truly meaningless to him.

         “Good. I’d hate to go through all this all over again.”

          There was a powerful scent of burnt pie crust as Sam stood, pushing away the heavy arm chair from the table and scowling down at his brother.

          “Yeah Dean, I’m sure that’d be a real inconvenience to you.”

          He left the room in a handful of long, angry strides, Dean watching with a blank look. Perhaps it was only from their knotting the night before, but Dean’s scent was stronger than usual, a harder presence in the room. Castiel cocked his head to one side.

          “That was…tactless.”

          His mate snorted and fidgeted with the tie on his robe.

          “Well, it’s not like this is a cakewalk for me – and you! – either. Having to pause cases all the time, leave them, even, coming up with excuses for why. Not eating out anymore, living on PB&J so his stomach doesn’t get upset from the smell of cooking. Trying to get _him_ to eat, at all. Seems like a damn good thing we’ve only got to do this once.”

           Castiel felt a sharp kind of ache in his chest, almost as if Dean had stabbed him. To distract himself from the sudden hurt and to keep from having to meet Dean’s eye, he picked up the book Sam had left and pretended to study the dusty cover.

          “It was Sam’s decision to accept this pregnancy and he is the one to suffer most throughout it all,” he said carefully. “Our role is merely supplementary, to care for him and the Nephilim, as needed. And he needs his brother, Dean. It must be very trying to be mate-less and pregnant, in a body that does not belong to you. Sam is making an effort, and it appears to be paying off. The child feels radiant.”

           He looked up finally to see Dean’s eyebrows meet in concentration, his expression still held in check but a wave of lemon and crushed pine needles wafting over the Alpha in the air.

          “I just never thought something like this would happen. I mean, Sam getting out and finding his own mate, starting his own pack, sure maybe, but not having a pup _here_. Not where you and me would really be a part of it.”

          “This is not Sam’s pup,” Castiel reminded him softly. “Not really. It’s likely none of us will see the child again after it’s born.”

           As for what would become of the precious point of light inside Sam after Seraphiel and her court decided it had outlived its usefulness… that was a topic he would have to avoid breaching with the Winchesters.

           Dean made to stand then, his face taking on that blank look once more. As Castiel followed him to the kitchen, he took one of Dean’s hands in his own again, and felt his mate’s grip tighten, pulling him along slightly with the strength of his hold.

          The gesture was equal parts protective, needy, desperate, and affectionate coming from a man who never said _I love you_. Castiel was unsure whether this meant his silent Enochian had been understood or not, and so he tried to be as gentle as possible in slipping his hand free so he could reach for the bag of grounds and finally get a start on making coffee for his mate.

 

* * *

         

          “Dean, you’re just being a complete fucking _asshole!_ And a jerk! And a moron, and just a…a…big, jerky Alpha idiot!”

          “Sticks and stones, little brother, you’re still not coming.”

          Dean knew, from heading out to warm up Baby, that it was a clear, sunny, only mildly freezing day outside, easily the first nice day of the year, and the knowledge made him eager to be gone. Especially since it meant escape from the whiny thing bitching at him from across the library.

          “I’m _fine,_ Dean, I can slide by with the Beta spray a few more times, c’mon, I’ve been stuck inside for a week and I’m not that noticeable…”

          Dean laughed then, couldn’t help himself.

          He’d humored Sam the last few cases, let him pretend that the Beta-in-a-can was actually covering up a scent that had turned so sweet, the whole bunker was starting to smell like a first-class bakery. He’d been patient making pit stops every five goddamn miles so Sam could empty his bladder and his gut. But the time had come to cut the crap. Even if the chemicals did somehow fool people into believing there wasn’t a pregnant Omega in their midst, there was no way they could miss the swell of Sam’s belly under his shirt.

          At almost four months, Sam couldn’t hide it and Dean couldn’t make up excuses anymore. Not a beer gut, not a food baby, but a real, live pup growing in there. Privately, Dean found it more than a little unnerving. The sight of his brother climbing awkwardly into the car or fussing with his flannels, the buttons stretched over his stomach, was just so unbelievably _weird_ he found himself speechless a lot, as Sam appeared to have reached a stage where everything Dean said was irritating anyway. Comments about the best way to off a wendigo were worth at least an eye roll, but pointing out that maybe it was time to hit the thrift store for some new threads seemed almost suicidal.

           Sam glared back and crossed his arms over his chest, like it would really do anything to hide the bump underneath.

          “Tell you what,” Dean caved, pitying him a little. “Go get dressed. If you can still fit into your suit, you can come.”

           There was the expected eye roll and annoyed huff as Sam went storming off.

           Dean made a ‘Can you believe this shit?’ face to Cas, who only responded with a ‘Be patient with your brother, Dean; you can’t both be dicks at the same time and he’s the one earning it’ look.

           Dean had no shame admitting that Cas was definitely their rock these days. He was not always sympathetic, but he still listened to Dean’s complaining about Sam’s bitchiness, even when the bitchiness was justified (on more than one occasion, Dean could confess he’d purposefully driven past a cheesesteak hut or Chinese restaurant just to shut him up with the smell). More importantly, Sam didn’t seem to find Cas as annoying, which meant they at least had a shot at getting through a drive without a fight.

          Dean checked his watch and drummed his fingers against the table in agitation.

          “Sam! You staying or going?”

          A minute later, Sam slouched back into the room, reeking of raspberry jam gone sour.

          “Staying,” he muttered, not making eye contact.

          Dean fought to keep a straight face as he left the room, clapping Sam on the back once.

          “Look on the bright side, Sammy, as least you know _you_ aren’t coming home covered in entrails tonight.”

          He lifted an eyebrow at Cas, silently asking, _Better?_ Cas just made an unimpressed little noise, and though Dean _was_ too, ah, tactful to ever mention it, by mid-afternoon, he knew for sure his crack about some bright side was probably of little comfort to Sam.

          Staying at home could never hold a candle to slashing up a big bad, even if it was for the good of angel-dom, and by proxy, humanity. Dean was all for grand gestures, of course, for making the hard calls to take out hell or abort the freakin’ apocalypse. But – he reflected while driving his blade home into the chest of the wendigo, spraying blood over himself, Cas, and a couple of teenagers screaming their heads off – this was where he truly belonged. Catching his breath to watch Cas soothe the kids (one was crying now while the other was going through the “What was that?! Who _are_ you?? I wanna go home!” routine), Dean felt his heart grow warm. His place in the world was here, in whatever little town something evil decided to terrorize, saving people side by side with his mate. He loved hunting. He loved Cas. And, he thought guiltily, dropping the slightly-less hysterical kids off at home, he loved his brother.

          “We should do something… y’know, nice for Sam,” he found himself saying, glancing over at Cas, who nodded.

          “He might appreciate some new clothing. We could slip some into his room covertly-”

           “So that he doesn’t have to get embarrassed bringing up that he needs it,” Dean finished, already pulling out his phone to search for a local mall. “Okay, but we’re saying it was all your idea. He’d probably rather go naked than wear anything I got him, with the state he’s been in.”

          “Dean, you really shouldn’t take Sam’s rudeness personally. He’s just frustrated right now, and subject to hormones that impact his mood. It’s not his fault.”

          “Easy for you to say, he’s not taking your head off every five minutes for no damn reason at all.”

          “I don’t go out of my way to be purposefully insensitive,” Cas replied bluntly, shooting him a look Dean called the ‘I am an angel, assbutt; listen up’ special. They’d pulled to a stop, so he got out of the car and set off for the mall entrance without looking back.

          Dean followed a few paces behind, aggravated into grumbling to himself under his breath.

          “I’m not _purposefully insensitive_ , he’s just way too over-sensitive!” he hissed once he’d finally caught up to Cas, at a large glossy map near the food court.

          Cas looked over the map for a minute and walked off again before answering, forcing Dean to keep up to hear him.

          “You could make a greater effort to be kind. It wouldn’t hurt you any to think about the feelings of other people before speaking, to actually consider that your words have power to upset the ones you love, Dean!”

          Cas had stopped in his tracks and whirled around to glare heatedly at Dean, his anger sharp like a burned out match. Dean blinked and retreated a step. It didn’t seem like they were talking about just Sam anymore.

          “Everything okay here?” An uncomfortably cheerful voice broke the tension and Dean turned to find a tiny Omega woman popping out of the pastel-colored storefront they’d turned up at.

           “We’re fine, thank you,” Cas said evenly, slipping into his stoic angel front. He stepped into the store and began looking around, once again indifferent to whether Dean was following or not.

           Dean opened his mouth to argue, yell, apologize, _something_ , but the woman pounced on this opening, smiling at them both so wide it looked painful.

          “Well then, welcome! My name’s Christine and I’d be happy to assist you with everything you need today! Getting an, uh, early start then?” Her eyes swept up and down Cas, who was digging through a rack of maternity shirts like they’d all personally insulted him.

          “I’m not pregnant. We’re shopping for his brother.” Cas thrust a few t-shirts at Dean as he spoke.

          “Sounds great! How far along is he?”

          “Fifteen weeks,” Dean answered, willing himself to just shut _up_ for once. He doubted Cas would be too impressed with him going all feral-Alpha in the middle of a baby store, and it didn’t seem like he could afford any more fuck-ups with his pack right then.

          “Oh, fun, fun! So it looks like you’re all set on clothing…” (Cas had piled a small heap of shirts on Dean’s arms and was now searching through the jeans for the longest pair they had) “But does he have a pregnancy pillow? Belly bands? Nipple cream? Essential oils? Peppermint, lavender, and lemon are our most popular sellers. How about cocoa butter? Or body oils? I highly recommend some for male Omegas because you can use either to soften up the birthing slit to prepare for the big event, and they also work great for stretch marks!”

          Dean almost dropped everything in shock at hearing the words “nipple cream” and “birthing slit” in reference to his little brother. For a moment, he could only stare back at the woman, open-mouthed, but from the corner of his eye, he was positive he saw Cas hide a smirk.

          “Uhhhh, right, that all sounds really…yeah. I guess he could use some…Cas?”

          His mate smiled outright now, taking most of the shirts and dropping them in a basket. He turned back to Christine.

          “We’d be very thankful for your assistance.”

          “Oh, super!” She took the basket from Cas to stuff a handful of crap in it already and sped off further into the store. This time Cas gave Dean an encouraging nod before he followed after.

          “I take it this is a first pregnancy then?” Christine asked conversationally, leading them down an aisle stocked with all kinds of terrifying creams and lotions.

          “Yep.” Dean found himself busy trying not to notice what else was going in the basket.

          “Too fun. And you must be getting excited to be uncles!” She paused, looking up from a display of tiny, colored bottles to beam at Dean. “Do you two have any pups of your own?”

          “Nope.” The word felt bitter coming out of his mouth.

          “Well, now you’ll have a little niece or nephew to spoil, anyway.” Christine held up a tiny green bottle. “How’s his nausea been? I’ve got people who swear by peppermint oil.”

          “He’s been sick nearly every day,” Cas answered, watching Dean carefully.

          “Then I’ll definitely send some peppermint with you, and you should tell his Alpha to whip up some preggy pops for him! I ate them my last two pregnancies, they’re a god-send.”

          “He’s unmated,” Dean forced himself to say, not bothering to ask what the hell preggy pops were.

          “Oh!” Christine stopped suddenly, eyes wide, in the process of hauling down a giant U-shaped pillow from a shelf. Dully, Dean mentally prepared himself for some gossipy questions, but she just smiled. Gently now, like a real person.

          “That’s too bad. It’s so much to take on by yourself; trust me, I _know_ ,” she told them in a soft voice, starting to ring up all the stuff at the register. “But he’s very lucky to have you two around to help him out. The support of your pack makes all the difference in the world, you know?”

           “Yes,” Cas answered for them both, catching Dean’s eye as Christine filled bag after pink, plastic bag, neither of them noticing what she’d even picked out.

            Back in the car, they loaded the backseat with the purchases and sat in silence for a time, the radio turned low and the hum of the road steady underneath Baby.

            “It probably would be much easier for Sam if he had a mate,” Cas said finally, and Dean grunted in agreement.

            “I know it would. Means a hell of a lot to me, having you around for good.”

            He was glad he’d risked the sappy sentiment when he saw how happy’d made Cas, his pink lips twitching upwards as the scent of honey swirled around them.

            They drove into the dusk quietly, and it was well-past nightfall by the time they were unloading the avalanche of pink-wrapped crap and lugging it inside.

            “Sammy! Cas got you a little somethin’!”

            Sam was propped up on his bed with his laptop and their biggest mixing bowl, full of what looked like rice-krispie treats, still in batter form. He slid the bowl to the floor with a guilty expression, made worse when he saw the amount of junk Dean and Cas were dropping on his bed.

            “What _is_ all this?”

            “Cas, well, me and Cas…” (Dean was being thrown another _look_ by his mate) “We just thought we’d stop and pick you out a few things, make your life easier. What’s this? Dinner?” He sat down at the edge of Sam’s bed and picked up the bowl, helping himself to the rice-krispie mixture.

            “It was the only thing I felt like eating today. I didn’t even try to get the stuff into a pan first,” Sam mumbled, cheeks flushed. “But you guys didn’t need to buy me all these things, I’m really fine.”

            “Think of it as a peace offering. Or even a late Christmas present, take your pick,” Dean told him thickly, mouth full of cereal and marshmallow. “I’ll try to be less of an asshole, okay? No more _purposefully_ tormenting you when I know you’re having a bad time.”

            He swallowed and fixed his brother with an apologetic look: _I’m trying to say I’m sorry, bitch_. Sam blinked and nodded easily, the message received. _You’re still a jerk, but it’s okay._

            Sam unwrapped his new wardrobe then, murmuring his approval as he went (Cas had done a good job sticking to mostly t’s, in neutral, masculine colors), before eyeing the bag of body oils and creams warily.

            “The hell are those for?”

            Dean coughed and tried to occupy himself with the microscopic labels on the back of the essential oils.

            “Stretch marks. And, uh…. um…your, uh…”

            “Softening the birthing slit for labor,” Cas finished promptly. “There’s also a cream for relieving nipple soreness. You’ll need to rub the oil directly on-”

            “OKAY Cas, I think I get the picture, thanks,” Sam cut him off in a hurry, eyebrows drawn up in horror. “And you got me a body pillow! Looks great, think I’ll try it out now, actually…”

            “We better let the man get his rest, Cas, c’mon,” Dean boomed, catching onto Sam’s desire to end this conversation _now_ and supporting it whole heartedly. He got to his feet and all but dragged Cas with him out of the room.

            “What’s wrong? You and Sam were getting along very well,” his mate pointed out stubbornly once they were out of earshot.

            “Nothing’s wrong, Sam just looked tired and we’ve had a long day, let’s go to bed.”

            “Is this about your discomfort with Sam’s changed anatomy? I’ve told you before, Dean, this squeamishness you both have can be attributed to your lack of experience with pregnancy and male Omega bodies. It’s only natural that you’d be uncomfortable with the idea of Sam having a birthing slit, given that you’ve never-”

           “Cas, say ‘birthing slit’ one more time and I’m drawing wards all over my bedroom door, I swear to God.”

 

* * *

       

            “What are you doing in there, hm?” Sam murmured, skimming gently over his belly. Everything he’d read said he was due to start feeling movement anytime now, but so far, there was nothing.

            Still, he didn’t worry. Even after reading a hundred panicked message-board comments from people who were convinced their babies were dead because they hadn’t felt them kick yet, Sam knew for sure his was alright.

            For one thing, Cas looked in on the fetus every few days, probing carefully with his Grace to check its growth and development. But mostly, Sam was still aware of the vibration humming under his skin. He’d gotten no closer to an explanation for what the feeling was, yet somehow he knew now it was connected to the unborn Nephilim’s well being. It was a constant in his life now, soothing him to sleep and greeting him in the morning as the first sensation he knew upon waking. He even felt grateful sometimes for the ever-present reminder that he was doing a good job and the baby was safe.

            “You can hear me now, can’t you?” he continued, and pulled up his still-baggy sleep shirt to press more firmly at the roundness, hoping to catch an answering flutter from within. “Soon you’ll be able to hear my brother, Dean, and Cas, who’s his mate and an angel like you. He’s the one who keeps checking up on you, making sure you’re okay. You _are_ okay, aren’t you? You’re not making me throw up so much anymore –which I appreciate by the way, thanks –so that’s got to be good, right?”

            Sam stopped abruptly, realizing what he was doing. He was talking to the Nephilim like it was his own pup. Like it would ever actually know him or Dean or Cas. Instead, it was nothing more than an ingredient, at least to the angels, something to be bred and used and after that… he didn’t even want to know. Four and a half months ago, he hadn’t thought twice about what would become of the creature inside him, not when the end result was so vivid in his mind. Now, with radio silence from the angels and way too much time to think, things didn’t seem as simple anymore.

            He said nothing more and heaved himself up out of bed. Sleep was coming easier these days, with the _amazing_ pillow Dean and Cas had got for him and without the need to puke multiple times a night. The sick, tired feeling that had surrounded him for so long was nearly gone.

            Of course, that came at a substantial price. Sam trudged to the bathroom, peed, splashed some water on his face, and examined himself in the full-length mirror. For weeks, he’d looked just bloated, then chubby, and finally fat, but now at last the shape of his belly was unmistakably _preggo_ (to use a term he’d unwillingly picked up from those message boards). He wasn’t big enough yet to have developed any annoying side-effects, although it was getting harder to bend over and his back twinged a little by the end of the day. There wasn’t a scale to be found in the bunker, but he guessed he’d probably gained about fifteen pounds so far.

            Sam made his way back to his room to face his real nemesis of the moment: clothing. Only a handful of his old shirts still fit over his bump, so he was forced to choose from the maternity t-shirts Cas had picked out for him. They were okay, really, it wasn’t like any of them were covered in lace or had dumb sayings printed across them, but they seemed to Sam an inescapable reminder that he couldn’t hide what he was doing from the world. To make himself feel less obvious, he usually layered an unbuttoned flannel over the shirts.

            He was starting to hate shoes. His feet had swollen up so that his boots pinched and ached, and it was becoming so much more effort to lace them up that he typically just wore socks as long as he possibly could. Sam kicked the boots to the side of his dresser out of irritation, took off his sleep shirt, and wriggled on a soft grey t and reddish flannel. Last of all, he pulled up the elastic waistband of his maternity jeans. These, he had no complaints about. Maternity jeans were stretchy and comfortable and totally awesome.

           With the thought of breakfast an appealing one today, he made his way to the kitchen, where Dean and Cas were already sitting, drinking coffee. His brother glanced up briefly from the newspaper.

            “Mornin,’ mama.”

            “Dean, stop calling me that.”

            Sam brought out milk and cereal and had barely sat down at the table when Dean tossed the folded paper over to him.

            “Mass suicide in Denver last night. It’s all over the news and web too. Angels.”

            Sam stopped in the middle of bringing his spoon to his mouth.

          _“Angels?”_

            “Twelve,” Cas put in quietly, not lifting his eyes from the photo, which showed two lines of covered bodies laid out in front of a church. “Each killed by a single stab wound to the chest. I believe it was a mercy killing; it wouldn’t be too hard to find a sympathetic angel with a blade.”

            “But…why?”

            “They were fallen, Sam. Many of my brothers and sisters are growing weary of life on Earth. I think we can safely assume they were trying to get back home. To Heaven.”

            Sam put down his spoon, struggling to digest this grim idea.

            “Would that work? Would dying take them back up top?”

            Cas spread his hands flat on the table, as if he was trying to anchor himself.

            “I don’t know.”

            The pack was quiet for a few moments before Dean stood. Going straight to Cas, he wrapped himself around his mate from behind and nuzzled him with the underside of his jaw. Cas closed his eyes and grabbed tight at the arms around him, leaning back into the embrace. A dewy, earthy scent settled over the kitchen.

            Sam found himself at a loss for what to do in the face of such a rare and obvious display of intimacy between the two. Cheeks flushed, he took up his spoon again and crunched noisily at his cereal until they seemed to have decided the moment was over and pulled apart.

            “Is there anything we can do?” he asked tentatively.

            Dean went to help himself to more coffee.

            “Authorities are calling it some kind of doomsday cult. Things might get hairy if they go looking for a perp, especially with no weapon found on the scene, but overall it’s not our kind of thing anymore. You just keep baking that bun and we pray to anyone still listening that the counterspell comes through.”

            His eyes dropped to where the grey fabric pushed out and Sam immediately got to his feet, feeling uncomfortable.

            “I think I’ll go into town today,” he announced as he took his dishes to the sink. “Pick up a book or groceries or something.”

            Sam expected his brother to protest, but Dean merely shrugged.

            “Okay. I’m ready, when do you want to go?”

            Sam stared at him.

            “Are you serious right now? I can’t go out by myself? You’re that worried about me?” He snorted a little, in spite of himself. “Are you _that_ kind of Alpha now?”

            “You’re an unmated pregnant Omega, Sam,” Dean hissed dangerously. The smell of leather and copper replaced the comfort aroma in the air. “Like hell I’m going to let a member of my pack walk around like that, unprotected.”

            Sam could only gape now.

            Ever since Dad had died and through everything after, even though he was an Alpha himself, he had accepted Dean as leader of their pack without question. It wasn’t only because he was older; Dean fell naturally to the roles of decision-maker, protector, and provider. And yet he rarely had pulled the tyrant card, having little need to give his mate or brother direct orders or demands. Seeing him like this, all domineering and reeking of threat, was unsettling to Sam.

            “Alright,” he finally said. “Let me just go get my shoes.”

            Baffled, he’d made it back to his room and was fighting with his boots when Cas appeared in the doorway. To Sam’s surprise, the angel looked somewhat amused.

            “What was all that about?” he asked under his breath, in case Dean was still hovering around.

            “I would apologize for Dean’s behavior, but that wouldn’t be quite right, seeing as he only behaved this way because of you.”

            Sam huffed and laced up his right boot gingerly.

            “I know, I know, I shouldn’t have provoked him with the Alpha quip.”

            “No Sam, that’s not what I meant.” Cas glanced out into the hall before taking another step inside the room. “You don’t seem to realize the impact your pregnancy has on Dean. Biologically,” he clarified when Sam looked up in confusion.

            “How…?”

            “Your hormones are affecting Dean’s moods and behavior just as they are affecting your own. You can’t detect it yourself, but you smell extremely vulnerable right now. Defenseless. Dean is trying to respond to that by guarding you, keeping you close. I don’t think he’s even aware of it, but this is his attempt to be a good Alpha, to protect the pregnant Omega in his pack.”

            Sam sat back on his bed, dumbfounded.

            “Seriously? All that just because I smell like cupcakes and kittens? I mean, I guess I knew that Alphas respond to things like this but I never expected Dean to go all feral on me.”

            The corners of Cas’ mouth twitched upwards.

            “I thought it might help you to know that Dean’s newfound protectiveness is not restricted to you. He is also attempting to place a more obvious scent mark on me, probably unconsciously, through physical contact.”

            Sam could see what was so funny now. Though his brother and Cas always retained a little of their other’s scent when they were separated, as mates, the idea that Dean would be trying to leave a noticeable claim – in essence, a message of ‘Alphas, touch this Beta of mine and I’ll rip you apart’ – on a celestial being capable of destroying anything in his path was, well, laughable. But also kind of…sweet? He chuckled to himself, and his frustration with Dean started to fade.

            “Don’t let him know I brought this up to you, he’ll just be embarrassed. Personally, I find his concern endearing. He cares for us so much.” Cas stopped talking abruptly. A shadow passed over his face, and just as quickly vanished, giving his scent a mournful, ashy lilt. He looked down at Sam. “Do you need help getting up?”

            “Nah, not yet.” Sam wondered briefly if this new weirdness was connected to Dean’s before he pushed himself upright and let Cas lead the way to the garage, where Dean was waiting by the car.

            “Where to?” he growled impatiently once they’d all clamored inside. Sam opened his mouth to offer a bitchy retort but caught Cas’ eye in the rearview mirror and stowed it back in.

            “The bookstore. Doesn’t seem like the Men of Letters had much use for books about pregnancy and I’m feeling kind of done with blogs.”

            Apparently Dean found this to be an acceptable destination because he drove them off without another word. Walking inside the store, Sam couldn’t help but notice that his brother did seem to be keeping even closer to Cas than was normal, brushing against him unnecessarily and shooting other Alphas aggressive glares. Sam felt a little bad for wanting to laugh, but Dean looked so damn _determined_ , like he was expecting a demon attack from behind the bookshelves and was prepared to defend his pack to the death. It was a good look for the middle of a hunt; much less so for a Wednesday afternoon in Lebanon.

            Biting his lip, Sam made his way through the store, losing Dean somewhere between the magazines and a fixture of classics, and Cas by a display of children’s books about space. He found the parenting section easily. A motherly looking Beta was standing and reading in front of the shelves, a diaper bag at her feet. She looked up immediately at Sam’s presence, and so he smiled as he reached for a few volumes. The woman did not smile back. Her mouth tugged at the corners, in a weak imitation of one, but the effect was just a pained grimace, and she quickly gathered her things and moved further down the aisle.

            Alright. So that was weird.

            Sam took his books to the end of the aisle and walked down the store until he found an empty chair beside an elderly couple. For a few minutes, he lost himself in the joy of reading, surrounded by the smell of coffee and dusty paper, but slowly he started to pick up on a whispered conversation near him.

            “…so proud too, just flaunting it like he owns the place.”

            “Must be his size. Omega that mammoth, probably used to passing as an Alpha right up until someone got cocky with the heat suppressants…”

            Sam’s cheeks burned and a burst of rage welled up in his chest. There was no doubt in his mind that the unassuming, shrunken old couple was talking about him.

            “Ah, well, got what he deserved, didn’t he? No mark and now a pup on the way. Poor little child, you’ve got to pray he does the right thing and gives it up.”

            “Okay, that’s _enough!”_ Sam exploded from his chair, fists clenched, books thrown to the ground. He towered over the two and fixed them with a furious gaze, but to his horror, they didn’t look remotely disturbed. The man lifted an eyebrow in silent mirth, and Sam realized the hot, musky scent he had come to associate with his own anger was missing.

            “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” he continued anyway, trying to spit as much fire in his words as possible. “And saying stupid crap like that about strangers is just pathetic. And ignorant.” The woman turned to her mate and they exchanged pitying looks, like they couldn’t possibly be bothered to answer.

            They didn’t see him as a threat. He _wasn’t_ a threat, not anymore, just a cocky Omega slut who’d gone and gotten himself knocked up.

            “There a problem here?”

            Dean had materialized out of nowhere to frown and stare down the couple, who finally had the audacity to look uncomfortable. Because an _Alpha_ was here to defend Sam, and the thought made him feel miserable to his very soul. He barely heard the man’s half-assed apology – “Sorry, son! Just see an awful lot of Omegas in your boat today, you know” – as he stalked back to the front of the store to pay for his books.

            “I don’t want to talk about it,” Sam told Cas’ questioning look and Dean’s angry grumble as they piled back into the Impala. But they’d gone barely half a mile before he sighed, gloom overcoming his shame.

            “Guess you won’t have to worry about escorting me on too many more outings then, Dean.”

            Dean snarled, filling the car with the tang of burning wood.

            “Sam, you can’t let assholes like that set the terms of your life! You’re a goddamn Alpha and they were just a couple of old washed-out has-beens who don’t know anything about anything, let alone that they just crapped on the guy saving angel-kind.”

            Sam knocked at the window with his knuckles for a moment before answering.

            “It wasn’t just them. Some lady gave me the once-over too. I just didn’t realize that attitude was still so prevalent in the world, Omegas having pups without mates being, like, immoral.”

            “That’s not who you are, Sam,” Cas spoke up. “This state is only temporary, and you are rendering a great service to the world with your selflessness.”

            “I guess.” Sam fell back deeper into the smooth leather backseat. “I dunno why this is getting to me so much.”

            Dean said nothing to this, but he must have sensed the day was a bust and took them straight back to the bunker without even asking Sam, for which he was thankful.

            Sam spent the rest of the afternoon flipping aimlessly through his new books, dragging his eyes across pictures of fetuses and uterine walls without taking much in. Dean joined him in the library around dinnertime, carrying a massive salad that he shoved under Sam’s nose.

            “Eat.”

            “No thanks. I don’t want it.”

            “Well, what do you want, then?”

            Sam considered for moment.

            “To get drunk.”

            Dean snorted and pulled up a chair, grimacing slightly as he caught sight of the open page across Sam’s lap.

            “What’s _that?_ A sea monkey?”

            “It’s a six-week-old embryo. By now, angel-baby looks more like…. this.” Sam flipped the book to an ultrasound image of an eighteen-week fetus. He hoped he spoke the truth. Cas never commented on the pup’s appearance, and it was, after all, still technically a monster.

            Dean just nodded sagely at the photo.

            “It really does look like the thing from _Alien_. I don’t know how you sleep at night.”

            “I probably won’t at all, now that I’ve got that mental image in my head.” Sam closed the book and set it aside. He eyed the salad wearily. It was more than just iceberg lettuce and cheese, so Cas must have had a hand in putting it together. “Dean, tell me that this is gonna be okay. Tell me that in a few months, we can just pretend none of this ever happened and everything will go back to normal. I just need to have that from my big brother for two seconds, okay?”

            Dean stared back, his gaze hard but his scent going soft with the smell of fresh cotton sheets.

            “It’s gonna be okay, Sammy. We’ve got you, me and Cas. We’re going to get you through this thing. You’ll pop the kid out, the angels will take it back and pull some kind of heavenly hoo-doo, and it’ll all be over.” He sighed, suddenly looking as worn out as Sam felt. “We can just forget there was ever even an angel-baby in the bunker.”

            Some piece of understanding seemed to click within Sam then. He scented Dean curiously, and sure enough, the citrus-pine was there again, infusing his brother’s confident posture with a quiet tone of longing. And it was longing. He knew now for certain.

            He finally picked up the bowl and arranged a bite on his fork.

            “That’s right, Dean. We can.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please note! This chapter comes with a *bonus* smut chapter, which I am posting as a separate piece. If filthy Sabriel pregnancy!kink doesn't sound like your thing, no worries, you won't miss any of the plot by skipping it, but if that kind of depravity is right up your alley, then please enjoy (I will probably never be able to look JarPad in the face now, but it was kind of worth it).
> 
>  
> 
> [(Sweeter by the) Pound Cake](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3878653)

* * *

 

           Castiel knew by now that humans had many positive traits about them that angels could never hope to achieve in the same measure – optimism, kindness, resourcefulness, love – but at times he felt that the inability to fly nearly trumped them all.

            Being mated to Dean meant he spent long amounts of time inside the Impala, traveling to different locations. Castiel treasured the hours they spent together, yet he couldn’t help but remember that they could have much _more_ time together if only Dean would let himself be flown around more often.

            But he continued to stubbornly resist, unless the circumstances were dire, and so nearly all of Castiel’s flights continued to be solo trips.

            Dean was still reluctant to let either member of his pack go off on his own and had held Castiel snuggled up to him in bed for an uncharacteristically long time that morning, imprinting him with his scent. Castiel did appreciate the comforting touch even though his mate’s precaution was unnecessary: his target today was angel, and fallen or not, would unlikely be able to read the scent-mark or bother to heed the (touching, but fairly useless) warning it carried.

            Ever since the deaths in Denver, Castiel and the Winchesters had been tracking other apparent suicides across the country, which progressed in an uneven path from Colorado to Louisiana, adding support to Castiel’s theory that another, single angel was responsible for the actual killings. Two days prior, there were another three deaths in Wisner, and so that was where he found himself, crisscrossing the town in search of evidence of one of his brothers or sisters.

            He touched down near an abandoned cabin overcome with weeds and froze, aware for the first time all day of the crackle of Grace.

            “Hello, Castiel. I wish I could say I was surprised to see you.”

            A thin, pale-looking man sitting on a stump near the cabin held the immense green-and-brown-praying-mantis form of an angel Castiel recognized at once.

            “Jehoel. But… why?”

            He had fought wars under Jehoel, who was a skilled strategist and fighter. But he was no mere soldier, on par with Castiel and his rank. Here before Castiel, flexing brittle fingers and dressed in faded clothes, was one of the great leaders of the Seraphs, second in command to only Seraphiel herself.

            “I won’t insult you by asking for clarification, Castiel. I know why you’re here. You intend to stop me.”

            “Then my suspicions are correct. You’ve been killing fallen angels.”

            “Only at their request.” Jehoel stood and paced in the dull grass. “I’ve been traveling, seeking out the ones who cannot bear to go on living –if you could call it that – on this pitiful planet. And I release them from their hurt. Surely there can be no sin in that.”

            Castiel studied the angel before him. He seemed exhausted, and when he spoke, even his True voice carried a wary tone that was equal parts jaded and bitter.

            “They wish to be released from their pain, but they want to go home. Is that where you send them, when you kill them, back to Heaven?”

            Jehoel lifted his face to the sky and raised his palms as if listening for an answer.

            “The result is not always predictable,” he finally said. “Some have returned to home, both as mortal souls and as their own True selves. Some have not, but whether they have been taken by Purgatory or somewhere else entirely is not known to anyone.”

            “A gamble, then. Do you tell them beforehand that their fate is not guaranteed?”

           “Of course. But know this, Castiel: of every desperate angel I’ve come to speak to, none yet have refused after being told their death is unknowable.”

            “Jehoel, why are you doing this? You are a Seraph, why aren’t you in Heaven, helping to develop the counterspell to bring all our brethren home?”

            Jehoel’s thin mouth twisted in a grim smile.

            “You speak of Seraphiel’s plot to reverse Metaron’s curse with the spell components you helped him gather. Naturally. I believe you are still in close contact with the Winchesters, including the demon-blood boy chosen to breed the Nephilim?”

            “Yes,” Castiel clenched his hands into fists.

            “An admirable gesture on his part, but, I think, wholly unnecessary.”

            “What do you mean.”

            “Oh, Castiel,” Jehoel sighed. “It didn’t come as any great surprise to us when you decided to take the human as your mate and remain on Earth, you know. You’ve always had too _much_ faith. Seraphiel’s plan was that of a despondent ruler backed into a corner, she’s admitted it herself.”

            “You don’t believe it will work,” Castiel finally guessed, watching closely as Jehoel began pacing again, one hand held within the other behind his back. “There’s no way to determine that it won’t though, not until it’s attempted, and in a few months, the Nephilim will be born and –”

            “And you’ll give it right up to Seraphiel and trust in her to sort everything out.” Jehoel closed his eyes briefly, shaking his head. “Well, do as you will. There is nothing more I wish to say to you today. But I _will_ continue to free our kind from this world, and I hope you don’t waste your time or energy trying to stop me from doing so. Care for your humans, Castiel, they need you far more than these lost ones.”

            There was a telltale rustle of feathers and Jehoel vanished, leaving Castiel alone in the marshy field.

           

            It took Castiel a few moments to locate the Winchesters once he arrived back home, carrying two bags of barbequed ribs from a restaurant in St. Louis Dean claimed to dream about, but eventually he followed their scents to the garage. There, Sam leaned back against the Impala, one hand resting on his stomach, while Dean tinkered under the hood of one of the other cars. Both brothers looked up at his arrival, or maybe just at the smell of the ribs.

            “Oh hell yeah, Cas wins Mate of the Year once again,” Dean moaned, wiping his hands on his jeans and taking the bags eagerly.

            “I know you actually have heard of washing your hands, right?” Sam asked his brother, accepting the loaded Styrofoam box he handed him.

            “Little motor oil never hurt nobody,” Dean countered, and began cramming meat into his mouth.

           “So,” he paused sloppily. “How’d it go today? You find ‘em?”

           Castiel went around to the other side of the car and touched the metal lightly.

          “Yes,” he started, watching the brothers eat. “I did find the perpetrator, but…”

           Reluctantly, he retold the events of the day, forcing out Jehoel’s exact words so that they could speak for themselves and preparing himself to see Dean’s crestfallen face and to scent Sam’s despair.

            However, to his surprise, neither of the brothers seemed very concerned at the news.

            “So one angel’s gone off the tracks and doesn’t trust the guys upstairs anymore,” Dean shrugged. “Living on Earth and pulling a Dr. Kevorkian will do that to you.”

            “Exactly, Cas, he’s not the only angel ever to question what goes on in Heaven.” Sam gave a meaningful nod in Castiel’s direction and licked his messy fingers.

            “Yes, and my rebellion caused the Fall, as well as consumed an uncounted number of angel and mortal lives,” Castiel reminded him, feeling frustrated. “And there’s also the matter of the fallen he’s certainly going to continue to _release_ , to use his term.”

            Dean and Sam glanced at each other, eyebrows raised in mild unease.

            “Look, it’s like you told Jehoel and like we’ve discussed before,” Sam explained. “There’s just no way to know if this is going to work or not without trying it. And it is really bad that more angels are going to want to off themselves before the counterspell is done, I know that, but there’s not much you can do. Jehoel is a Seraph, and he’ll probably be a lot more discreet now that he knows you’re watching him. I don’t think this changes anything. Besides,” he smiled and patted his stomach. “I’ve made it this far. I kind of want to finish it out.”

            Pacified slightly, but not convinced, Castiel turned to his mate only to have Dean nod in agreement.

            “Sorry, babe. If you wanna go after this guy again, that’s your call, but it sounds to me like he was just trying to get you off his trail. Thanks for the grub though, it was awesome.”

            Dean resumed his work on the car and Sam settled back again, effectively closing the subject. Lost in a strange mixture of exasperation and reassurance, Castiel joined Sam at the car and helped himself to a long drink of Dean’s beer.

            “Anyway,” his mate said, picking up the conversation that Castiel had interrupted. “We can go pick you out some new pants tomorrow, but we’re going someplace else, that lady was Stepford wives-freaky.”

            “Good. I’m okay for now, but I don’t know how long I’ll be able to keep wearing these jeans. I feel like a house,” Sam grumbled.

            Dean peered up from his project.

            “Yeah. You guys sure there’s only one in there?”           

            Castiel cut in before Sam, flushed with anger at the remark, could answer.

            “I’m positive. Sam’s weight gain seems to be perfectly healthy. It’s entirely possible though that the child will just be larger than average. Sam, you weighed nine pounds, three ounces at birth, and Dean was nearer to ten.”

            Dean cast his brother a wide-eyed look.

            “Dude. How’d you like to push _that_ out?”

            “Please don’t make me think about that,” Sam groaned, grabbing at his stomach as if willing the infant inside to shrink.

            “Okay.” Despite his earlier disgust surrounding the pregnancy, Dean seemed to be enjoying the conversation. Castiel suspected that the pleasure of taunting his brother was enough to overcome the aversion. “At least you’re not still barfing up everything, right?”

           “No,” Sam answered dryly. “Now my back hurts and I have heartburn, like, all of the time, I still have to pee every time I stand up, and everything aches, but mostly my feet.”

            “And you’re walking funny now,” Dean added cheerfully.

            Sam stared back at him.

            “Um, no I’m not?”

            “Sure you are.” Dean set down his tools and placed one hand against his back to start an impressive mimic of his brother’s slow, swaying gait.

            Sam flushed again, coloring the air with salt-and-vinegar embarrassment.

            “I’m not…that isn’t….”

            “Don’t worry about it, Sam,” Castiel tried to soothe. “The weight will throw off your center of balance more as time goes by, but another source of the change in your walking is the new shape of your pelvis. Your hips are gradually widening, to make enough room for labor.”

            Unfortunately, Sam looked even more upset at this information.

            “Can we please, _please_ be done talking about this?”

            Dean laughed and returned to his work.

            “Sorry, Sammy.” He yanked out a handful of greasy bolts from the car engine, humming to himself, before asking, “So do we even know if it’s going to be a dude or a chick? Cas? You dig around in there almost every day, can’t you tell?”

            “No. I can’t determine the physical form of the Nephilim, I only connect with its Grace, which gives me an impression of its overall well-being. It’s a similar process to sensing the Grace of another angel, and so I assume I would know if it were weak or dying. Besides,” Castiel couldn’t help but give in to the very human desire to roll his eyes. “Infants don’t have genders, and neither do angels, as I’ve explained to you several times.”

            “Yeah, yeah, limitations of the human sex binary and the thing about bees, I remember. But you do _look_ like a dude, and then you actually were for a while, and it’s easy to forget, you know?”

            “I only allow you to refer to me as a man because you can’t understand Enochian or the complex names and pronouns we use for ourselves. Though this body is mine now, it is still only a vessel for my True form, which is what shapes my identity as a celestial, genderless being. Not my facial hair or genital configuration.”

            Castiel felt frustrated again, but Dean’s eyes were shining with pride and he smiled as he pressed a kiss to the corner of Castiel’s mouth.

            “I know, babe, you’re a big ‘ol scary, smart, and totally gender-free wave of Heavenly glory. And it’s friggin’ awesome that you’re mine. And it’s a shame your True form is so beautiful it would burn my eyes out or whatever, but I happen to like this boring, blue-eyed human vessel, okay?”

            Castiel hardly had time to feel pleased at the warm words before Sam – who had been quiet for some time, still holding at his stomach – broke in.

            “Guys? I… I think I feel something.”

            He pressed harder, face screwed up in concentration, before lifting his hand entirely, a look of shock spreading across his features.

            “I can feel it,” he whispered. “It’s like, fluttering, or something, c’mere.”

            Castiel and Dean all but pounced on him, both laying a hand side by side where Sam had pressed.

            “Do you feel that?”

            “No,” Dean frowned, but Castiel experienced a tingling jolt the moment he laid his hand down. In just the few days since he’d last touched the Nephilim’s Grace, it seemed to have exploded in depth and magnitude, manifesting not only in the spark of spiritual energy, but also the expected, tiny flickers of movement from deep within Sam’s womb.

            “Yes,” he breathed, wondering what actions from the baby translated into the sensation. Was it kicking? Punching with minute fists? Or was it more passive than either of its parents, merely rolling over inside the warm, liquid sanctuary?

            Sam beamed at him, perfuming the garage with airy, sunshine affection.

            “Sorry, Dean, guess it heard you talking shit. I’m starting to like this kid.”

            Dean just scowled and went back to his car parts.

 

* * *

 

           "Sammy? You in here, man?”

            Somehow, Dean had managed to misplace his brother. He’d been there at breakfast, inhaling his Cheerios, and then he was just gone, without a word as to where he was going. Everything with wheels was still parked in the garage and Dean doubted even Sam was ambitious enough to go running in his state, but he wasn’t in the library or his bedroom or the shooting range (Dean made himself laugh out loud at the mental image of a pair of earmuffs stretched over his belly to protect the pup’s ears) or any of the dozen studies and storage rooms they rarely bothered with, and he didn’t answer any of Dean’s calls into each one.

            By now, Dean was fully aware that his behavior was riding the line between ‘concerned older brother’ and ‘actually kind of fuckin’ weird’ pretty hard. He just couldn’t seem to help himself. The bigger and lazier and more housebound Sam got, the more he wanted to keep him close. If all went well, they still had a good thirteen weeks of this, but he’d overheard Cas explaining that the kid would probably be good to go if it came out now and Sam had knocked over an entire box of nails with his belly the day before – hadn’t even _seen_ it – and, yeah, Dean felt like maybe somebody should damn well be concerned.

            Just as he was about to call Cas, he caught a whiff of roasted pineapple upside-down cake and followed the trail easy to the open doorway of a room he’d never been in before. Immediately, he wondered how that was even possible. It seemed to be some kind of old-fashioned gymnasium and was big and open, with padded floors, mirrored walls, and racks of slightly rusty weights. Right in the middle was Sam, squatting on a yoga mat and apparently checking his form in the mirror. He stood up as soon as Dean walked across the faded, squishy floor, rubbing at his neck self-consciously.

            “Prenatal yoga,” he answered before Dean could ask. “Supposed to limber up the birthing muscles, so hopefully I don’t tear something.”

            Dean nodded in understanding.

            “Got a little freaked when I saw you in here, I was worried you were turning into one of those weirdos who works out their whole pregnancy and, like, loses weight. I mean, what’s the point of being pregnant if you don’t even let yourself get fat? It’s like the only time you’re allowed to eat crap all day and no one can say boo about it.”

            He tried to aim for an easy-going tone but almost instantly wanted to hit himself in the face. In the past few weeks, Sam had reverted to his pissed-off mode, with a few new complications. First, his anger seemed to come out of nowhere now and disappear just as fast. He’d yelled, actually _yelled_ , at Cas for getting him a fork instead of a spoon and complimented him on his cooking barely thirty seconds later. Second, the target of his rage was no longer solely Dean. Anyone was fair game these days: Cas, people taking too much time in the crosswalk, a woman at the grocery store who tried to touch his belly. It was a little bit funny but mostly terrifying.

            Obviously today was Dean’s lucky day though, because Sam just shrugged and stretched his arms over his head lazily.

            “No. I’m definitely in a good place with eating now. In fact, ‘s it lunchtime yet?”

            “Probably.” Dean could let him have that, at least. “How’s the parasite?”

            Sam touched his stomach lightly, testing the waters.

            “She’s good. Kicking off and on.”

            Dean had been trying to stop himself from reaching out to feel (the pup seemed prone to some kind of shyness whenever he was around) but froze when he realized what he’d just heard.

            “Did you say _she?”_

             Sam blinked and looked down at himself, confused.

            “I guess I did,” he admitted slowly. “It just came out, but… I think I’m right. That feels right.” He closed his eyes and concentrated for a beat. “Yeah. I don’t know how, but I know it’s a girl. It’s like she’s telling me herself.”

            “Woah.” Dean stared at the bump, puzzled and impressed. “How’s it doing that? Are you getting anything else? And Cas said angels don’t even have genders. Guess it’s just a double freak of nature then, right?”

            He knew immediately he should have just shut up and let Sam enjoy the moment.

            “ _She_ , Dean, _she’s_ the double freak of nature, and that’s probably why she never moves for you, because you’re so full of crap about everything!” Sam exploded, giving off waves of balsamic vinegar, which signaled that, for however brief a time, he was good and pissed. “I don’t know how she’s telling me, she just is; it’s not like this is an exact science, okay?” His eyes narrowed. “What are you even doing here in the first place? You don’t have to follow me around everywhere, Dean, me and my monster bastard are capable of going five minutes without you checking in, so why don’t you just leave me _alone!”_

            And thankfully, Dean still retained enough sense to do just that, hands up and backing quickly out of the room.

            Indulging in a little wound-licking along the way, he eventually found himself back at the library, where Cas was seated in front of the big, digital map, frowning to himself, chin in hand.

            “So get this,” Dean was eager to share with his mate. “Sam thinks the baby is a girl. Says she told him, I don’t know, telepathically or something.”

            But Cas didn’t seem very interested in the news. He didn’t even bother to look up as he answered, “It’s plausible that Sam could develop such a degree of closeness with the child. He may well be right.”

            “But you said even you couldn’t tell, and that it should be junk-less,” Dean pointed out, deflated but pleased with himself for remembering.

            “Sam and the Nephilim share a much more intimate relationship. Maybe he’s responding to its Grace in a different way than I ever could. And the child is half-human, so it will be born with a sex, and perhaps Sam is somehow tapping into its gender identity, which may be part of what it is currently developing neurologically.”

            He still hadn’t taken his eyes off the map, so Dean sided up to see what was so goddamn fascinating. Little red dots were sprinkled all over the East coast and Cas was staring at them like they were about to cough up all the answers in the universe.

            “Cas… babe, you’ve gotta stop messing with this. We don’t know shit about how Jehoel’s picking where to go next, haven’t even come close to tracking him down or tracing his path.”

            “There has to be something, Dean!” Cas finally looked up, burning with frustrated passion. “He’s finding them somehow. I can’t just allow him to continue to do this, not when-”

             He cut himself off and went back to studying the map, eyes moving a little too fast across it.

            “Not when what?” Dean felt incredibly done by now with getting his ass chewed out for no damn reason. “When _what,_ Cas? What is it?”

             Cas just shook his head.

            “It isn’t important. At least I hope it isn’t.”

            This annoyingly cryptic statement tipping him over the edge, Dean turned on his heel and stormed off down the hall.

            Both members of his pack just wanted to bitch today? Fine. They could bitch at each other, because he’d reached his limit.

            The roar of his Baby’s engine and the cool of her leather interior calmed him, helped him decide what he wanted. And what Dean Winchester wanted right then was a good shot of something dark and fiery.

            At the liquor store, he picked up a bottle of bourbon and set it on the counter. The pretty, dark-haired owner turned around from the back shelves in surprise (it was only just noon), then smiled with casual recognition.

            “Haven’t seen you around in a minute,” she said, ringing him up.

            Dean forced out a smile to acknowledge her friendliness. She spoke the truth; he’d cut out drinking almost entirely over the past six months, out of sympathy for Sam.

            The woman bagged the bottle and looked at Dean closely before passing it over. She was an Alpha, and he knew she was scenting him.

            “You’ve got a pup now, or one on the way,” she guessed easily. “I know that scent, but I know that look.”

            “I’ve got a _look?”_ Dean asked, surprised, hand paused on the bag.

            “Like you’re scared shitless, fed up with the world, and worried as hell, all at once. Must be your mate then, the good-looking guy in the coat?”

            “No.” Dean dragged his purchase across the scuffed counter. “My brother.”

            “I see.” The woman smiled again, cautiously, as if sensing he didn’t want to talk about it. “Well, congratulations then, on the addition to your pack.”

            “Thanks.” For the barest moment, it was on the tip of his tongue to correct her, to explain the whole, messy ordeal, but of course it passed and he picked up the bag to leave. “See you around.”

 

            Dean parked near the edge of the lake and got out to stretch. It had been a decent drive to get here, causing him to rack up a few texts apiece from Cas and Sam, but he was glad he’d made the trip. The afternoon was brisk and sunny, with long beams of light playing out over the water. He leaned up against Baby’s hood and took two measured sips of the bourbon, humming with satisfaction at the burn.

            He wished Dad were here. No, wait, he told himself angrily, shaking his head, that wasn’t true at all. He just wished someone else was around to help shoulder the responsibility of trying to save the world.

            He wished Bobby were here.

            No doubt, he’d know exactly what to say to Cas, exactly what to do for Sam. Damn, but Dean missed his gruff, dry-eyed advice.

            “Wonder what you’d think if you could see us now,” he mused out loud, taking another sip. “Angels out of heaven, Sam Omega-fied and knocked up, and me with my tongue up Cas’ ass half the nights, us as real mates. You probably saw that coming ten miles away though, seems like everyone else did but me.”

            Dean paused to listen to the wind, almost expecting to hear an answer. When there was nothing, he kept going.

            “So now we’re having a baby. Except not really. Soon as that kid comes out, Sam’s got to give it back to the angels, in what’s probably the worst custody deal of the century. Or the best, I guess. Can’t imagine Sam wanting a pup right now, not before he’s all settled down in the suburbs with his own mate. But he will. It’ll work out for him, he deserves that.”

             He felt cold suddenly, and wrapped his jacket up more tightly. The wind came through just as strong, carrying the smell of wetness and green, growing things. Not cold, he realized. Just blue. But he could tell Bobby.  

            “It’s not right, is it? Feeling like this? Feeling cheated, like getting with Cas would ever have come with possibility of us having kids of our own. Even if we could… we wouldn’t. I’m a Hunter, Bobby, just like you and Dad, and you did real good by us, but I don’t think I’m made like that. I think…he rubbed off on me too much.”

            The wind kicked up stronger than before, like it was mad at Dean personally, and whipped his raw skin.

            “But maybe not, right?” He went on, ignoring the cold and the bourbon now. “Sam _is_ gonna have kids someday, and that’s something, isn’t it? Some kind of proof that we’re not damaged beyond repair? I just need him to be able to move on, if he wants, to know I haven’t wrecked him. Him and Cas…they’re my whole world, Bobby. I guess I just…”

            He snorted and knew exactly what Bobby would say to him then.

            “I just need to Alpha up and let my pack bitch it out if they need to; I ain’t made of porcelain and spun-sugar.”

            Dean watched the sun dipping over the sky. Suddenly, he felt like going home, felt ashamed of himself for ever having left in the first place. He dropped the bourbon carelessly among the weeds.

            They needed him.

 

            Dean would be the first to admit there were bonuses to staying home more often, and zoning out in front of the TV almost every night was pretty damn awesome.

            They’d worked their way through Game of Thrones, and the Dark Knight trilogy, and Star Trek – the original series, blue eye shadow and all – and were midway through the movies, but tonight _Ocean’s Eleven_ was on cable, so Dean agreed to put off _The Voyage Home_ until tomorrow.

            It was cozy, with the three of them propped up on Sam’s bed in front of the big TV, but the closeness appeased Dean’s instincts to keep his mate and the pregnant Omega near him. Having Cas nestled up on his chest and Sam relaxed and safe lulled Dean into a deep state of satisfied-Alpha bliss. He’d come home to find both of them concerned about his absence, but completely uninterested in rehashing the morning’s conversations, so Dean was happy to just let bygones be bygones and spend a quiet night with his pack.

            The movie went to commercial and Sam bent forward as far as his belly would allow to stretch his back. He’d polished off an entire medium pizza and carton of Cherry Garcia all by himself, which honestly wouldn’t be too out of the ordinary if he hadn’t decided to wash it all down with a jar of green, pimento-stuffed olives. Dean chose not to comment on this. He _was_ learning; slowly maybe, but learning just the same.

            Instead, he dragged his nose slowly through Cas’ soft hair, breathing in his comfort-scent of _feather-down roasted nuts warm cherry pie_. Cas’ capable fingertips stroked gently over his bicep. It would have been as close as they got to paradise for just a minute… if Dean didn’t catch the wet snuffle sounding right next to him.

      Painfully, he pulled himself to look over at Sam and was treated to a sight way more terrifying than his brother almost breaking a stranger’s hand in the ten-items-or-less line.

            Sam’s eyes were red, his chin was fucking _wobbly,_ and there were big, fat tears running down his cheeks and staining his shirt. It was some full-on sobbing, and luckily Cas sensed something was happening and pushed himself upright because Dean was too freaked to even move.

            “Sam! What’s wrong?”

            Sam looked over in surprise, like he’d forgotten they were there, and quickly wiped his face on his sleeve. A few more tears leaked out, but he scrubbed them away forcefully.

            “Sorry,” he said in a raspy voice. “It was just that commercial, with the kids, and their dads, and the pictures and stuff…” He sniffed, chin wobbling all over again, and his voice cracked. “They just love each other so much, and it’s really getting to me, okay?”

            The last part dissolved into a watery mess as Sam started up even harder than before, shoulders shaking, face buried in his hands.

            Dean and Cas exchanged disbelieving looks, verifying with the other that Sam was in fact bawling his eyes out over a graham cracker commercial.

            They let him go at it for a few minutes, Cas evidently just as reluctant as Dean was to try and stop him. Finally the sobs tapered off into rattling, full-body sniffs, and Cas wordlessly handed him the tissue box from the nightstand so he could mop up the tears and snot.

            “T’anks,” Sam wheezed, blowing his nose. He coughed a few times and seemed to come back to himself then. “Um. I don’t know what that was, but sorry you had to see it.”

            “Hormones,” Cas supplied, and that was the last word on the subject as both Winchesters were too embarrassed to say anything else. The rest of the evening passed smoothly, although Dean couldn’t help but catch Sam’s face scrunching up with emotion every time that damn commercial came back on. 

            Eventually the movie ended and the three of them drowsed through whatever boring cop show came on after until Sam told Dean he was kicking them off his bed, claiming exhaustion. Cas bounded off immediately, wishing Sam a good night on his way out the door, but Dean found himself lingering. He didn’t feel good about leaving his brother, all of a sudden.

            “Dean, out. I wanna go to bed.”

            “I’m going, okay, I’m going.” He stood, but only slowly inched back to the doorway, watching as Sam dragged back his blankets to curl up under them. “It’s just that, you’re so far away at night.”

           Sam gave him a confused, irritated look from where he propped his head up on his pillow.

            “Yeah…. and that’s a good thing, remember? You might not be able to put a baby in Cas, but I can sure hear you guys trying.”

            His face tensed up in realized horror, but Dean just waved off the comment that would have had the power to cut him up bad inside, had he sensed Sam meant any cruelty by it. As it was, they were both tired, and he knew he should go, but the damn Alpha in him screamed to watch over this wounded Omega. Screaming back that Sam was _not_ wounded did no good; the smell of his sappy commercial pain still hung in the air.

            “Sure you don’t want me to, uh, stay the night with you?”

            Sam looked even more frustrated and bewildered and Dean couldn’t blame him. That kind of shit was more in line with Cas’ brand of creepiness, only without the romantic undertones that made Cas’ watching Dean sleep acceptable.

            “Dean, just go to bed, and I’ll see you in the morning. I’ll be fine,” he promised. Even his eyes looked softer now, Dean noticed, at least when he wasn’t screaming at anybody.

            Dean wavered for another few seconds in the doorway before telling his instincts to shove it. Bed and Cas were waiting for him.

            “Night, Sammy.”

            “Night, Dean.”

            His last thought as he wrapped himself around Cas and settled his nose back in that gorgeous scent was, surprisingly, of Mom. An image of Mary sitting alone in front of the TV, crying, but laughing through her tears, floated through his subconscious and wove itself around the edges of his dreams so gently that he wouldn’t remember it at all in the morning.

* * *

 

            Sam awoke with a start, sending his book and the mixing bowl (now christened the rice-krispie bowl) flying. It was only another of the pup’s well-aimed punches to his kidney, but he was astonished he’d been able to fall asleep in the first place.

            Since passing the seven-month mark, his physical state had descended from fairly inconvenient to him wanting to go back in time to thank Mary Winchester for going through this twice. His body was an all-out war zone. Even maternity jeans were torturous now, as Cas was one hundred percent correct in predicting his hips expanding. The change was so huge Sam could actually see a difference in the bathroom mirror: from behind, he could pass for a surprisingly hot girl. So he just stopped looking in the mirror, and practically lived in loose, stretchy yoga pants, whether he was going to do yoga that day or not. Mostly not, because of the next hurdle.

            Out of practicality, the Winchesters were not sentimental, and rarely thought to document their lives with pictures, but a few months back, Dean had been in one of his asshole moods and snapped a photo of Sam bitchface-ing a plate of spaghetti (probably for blackmail reasons more than sentimentality). Sam had found the picture a few days before while digging through Dean’s phone for a contact, and (after cussing out his brother for taking it in the first place) had been amazed at how huge he’d gotten in the short amount of time. In the photo, his belly stuck out, sure, but now it _consumed_ him. He couldn’t see his feet, hadn’t seen his own dick in ages, and needed almost a full minute to get up from sitting, two from lying down. And he really did waddle, although Dean had wised up enough to not point this out.  

            Then there was the stuff going on inside his massive belly.

            After months of radio silence, angel-baby was more than making up for Sam’s lack of activity. He didn’t need Cas to verify that she was healthy and strong, not when his life was being constantly disrupted by what he could only imagine were advanced gymnastics. The kicks and punches that had seemed so miraculous at first were now par for the course, either against his internal organs or out across his stomach, causing ripples of motion that horrified Dean (“That’s a fucking _foot,_ and it’s moving, guys, that thing wants _out._ ”).

            The commotion usually stopped an hour or so before Sam went to bed, but started up again about two in the morning. Not that the time was much of an inconvenience; he had to pee so often it was basically a waste of time to even leave the bathroom, so he was almost always awake. But by three or four, he was outright begging the baby to go back to sleep.

            Out of exhausted desperation, Sam tried to tap into whatever line of communication she had used to teach him her gender. He gave commands, sent mental pictures, and even prayed to the kid, but either Nephilim didn’t have access to the hive mind or she was deliberately ignoring him. Sometimes, when Sam felt himself nodding off right on the toilet seat, he sensed a pulse in the vibration between the two of them, followed by a brief impression of amusement and then quiet. He hadn’t brought this up to Dean or Cas. He knew they were only humoring him about the pup being a girl; admitting that she was laughing at him too was pushing it.

           And so, between the belly, the baby, the bladder thing, and the amount of time it took him to get to and from bed, Sam was lucky to hit a full night’s sleep anymore. That he’d dozed off in the middle of reading was surprisingly only because he’d napped for so long: almost twenty minutes according to a glance at his watch.

           He was still scrubbing the itchiness from his eyes when he recognized a familiar presence and anxious scent in the room.

          “You okay?”

          “Fine, Dean.”

          There was no point in trying to push away his brother. Every reassurance, insult, or threat Sam made seemed to just bounce right off Dean and he was back again in minutes, like a really loyal, really stupid guard dog. Besides, Sam found he actually kind of needed support for certain things these days, things like tying his shoes and picking stuff off the ground, and on one embarrassing occasion, picking his own ass off the ground after he got cocky with his yoga practice.

          He could see now why people liked to undertake this process with a mate. His brother and Cas were great about the whole thing, but Sam just didn’t feel comfortable asking either of them to rub his sore back.

          “You want me to bring you some lunch?”

           Dean still hovered near the doorway, obviously bent on fulfilling his ‘Help Sammy’ quota for the day.

          “No,” Sam answered, beginning to push himself to the edge of the bed. “I should get up, anyway.”

           He clamored to his feet awkwardly, waving away Dean’s efforts to grab his arm and pull him up. It was a practical gesture, but he didn’t like feeling helpless.  

           With Dean following close after, Sam shuffled into the kitchen and emptied the fridge, piling everything that sounded good on the counter. This had become an almost daily ritual, so his brother didn’t bother to comment.  

            Dean did seem to have something on his mind though. He coughed and fidgeted and finally sat down at the table, rolling an apple from hand to hand.

            “You’re getting pretty close now.”

            “Yep.” Sam started to assemble a double-decker sandwich. He couldn’t decide between PB&J and pastrami, so he went with both.

            “Right, and I was just thinking today… how are we gonna do this?”

            Sam looked up at the scent of Dean’s cracked pepper worry, but he just shrugged and took a bite of sandwich.

            “Kind of a solo event, isn’t it? I hunker down, push her out, scar us both for life?”

            “I’m talking about where this whole thing is gonna go down. You want us to take you to the hospital, or what?”

            Sam paused to think about this. Incredible as it seemed, he hadn’t given much thought to specifics of the actual birth. Before, it had always seemed too distant to worry about, or something that would eventually resolve itself, but now faced with the reality of labor approaching fast, he felt a twitch in his gut that he knew was not the pup.

            “I don’t think so. I mean, we’ve made it this far without doctors, right? The angels will be watching and Cas can keep track of how she’s doing, and I’d really just be more comfortable going through with it here, at home.”

            Dean nodded, quietly reeking with waves of sick anxiety and fear. But he swallowed hard and straightened his back, gathering himself.

            “Whatever you want, man, you’re the one who has to do the heavy lifting. If you’re good with us pulling a DIY, then you’ve got it.”

            “I trust you, Dean,” Sam assured him softly. And he did. Even at his most freaked state, no one could possible care for him more.

            Dean looked calmer then.

            “Okay,” he exhaled. “So that’s all wrapped up.”

            Noticing Sam had finished his sandwich, he got up and took out the marshmallows and rice-krispie box.

            “Where’s your bowl?”

            The wave of unstoppable, foreign emotion that threatened to drown Sam at any given moment these days welled up. This time, it was an overwhelming sense of gratitude. Tears filled his eyes and he tried to blink them away before they could leak out, but it was no good.

            “Oh, c’mon!” Dean cringed, turning to busy himself with the ingredients. “What’s with the waterworks?”

            “I’m sorry!” Sam groaned. He quickly wiped his eyes, trying to force himself to stop. “It just comes from out of nowhere. I get set off by the smallest things and it’s like I can’t help it, I get so happy or sad or pissed that I just start _crying!”_

            “Yeah, I’d rather have you cussing me out, if I’m being honest,” Dean muttered, side-stepping out of the room to either get away from Sam’s ridiculous sobbing or to go collect the rice-krispie bowl, but at any rate, it just made Sam go off even harder. At least until his mood pendulum swung back after about ninety seconds and he found himself annoyed with Dean for taking so long to return with his bowl.

 

            The Winchester pack spent the leisurely afternoon in the library. Sam researched natural labor online (and almost instantly began to have second thoughts about his birth plan), Cas pored over something dusty written in Latin, and Dean alternated between watching dumb videos on his computer and walking around the room for no discernable reason, usually asking Sam if he needed anything.

            “I’m good, Dean,” he’d answered for the hundredth time, but suddenly he wet his lips and reconsidered. “Actually… do we have any licorice?”

            “Ah, no?” Dean stopped his relentless pacing, thrown by the request.

            “Okay,” Sam sighed and tried to return to his work, but now that the thought was in his mind, he was having trouble concentrating now on anything besides gummy strands of tangy, black licorice. It was beyond a passing fantasy: it was irresistible.

            “Dean. Wait. I need it.”

            “What, you _need_ licorice?”

            “Yeah,” Sam breathed, taken aback himself by the forcefulness of his desire. “Get me some.”

            “Cas, you go,” Dean turned to his mate.

            “No,” Cas answered unexpectedly. “I’m involved with this right now, and you could do with getting out of the bunker.”

            Dean reeled, whipping back and forth between Sam and Cas like he couldn’t believe either one of them.

            “It’d take _you_ about ten seconds, babe, you can’t be serious!”

            “Dean, you keep trying to help me out, so help me. Black licorice. Now, please.”

            Dean was already jingling his keys, but he shot back a bewildered look.

            “Sam, you _hate_ black licorice.”

            “Dean!” Sam and Cas shouted together, and the synchronicity was finally enough to force Dean from the room, shaking his head and stomping his boots.

            As soon as they’d heard the roar of the Impala starting up, Cas let go a sigh of relief.

            “That was clever thinking, inventing a craving like that.”

            Sam started to laugh before he realized Cas was completely serious.

           “Dude, I wasn’t inventing anything, I really do feel like I’m gonna die if I don’t get my hands on some candy.” He looked the angel up and down curiously. “Wait, were you trying to get rid of Dean?”

            Cas dipped his head and smoothed the corner of his book, shifting a little in his seat.

            “Not exactly. Lately, Dean’s sense of protectiveness and concern have just been… well-developed and sometimes I feel that-”

            “Yeah, he’s annoying the shit out of me too.”

           

            By the time Dean got back, Sam was close to tears of gratefulness once again. Not for the bag of licorice he brought (although that was still extremely welcome), but for his mate. Ever observant, Cas had recognized the source of Sam’s pained winces, forced him back to bed to lie on his side, and proceeded to go to town massaging every lump, kink, and sore spot in his back. It was – to use a term that had fairly sour connotations anymore – _heavenly_.

            “He’s damn good at that, hmm?” Dean grinned, helping himself to a licorice whip.

            Thankfully, Sam was too blissed out to think about the circumstances in which Cas gave his brother back rubs. He offered up a lazy sigh and chewed at his candy.

            Dean sat quietly for a minute, watching.

            “So… you need anything? Water or whatever?”

            Sam cracked one eye open, struck with sudden inspiration.

            “Dean, it’s actually really good that you’re back. Jody called a little while ago, she needs our help in Sioux Falls. Problems with a new vamp nest, sounds like it might be the one that got away from us a while ago.”

            “Well, didn’t you tell her that we’re on hiatus right now?”

            “She sounded very upset, Dean,” Cas chimed in, squeezing gently at Sam’s shoulder in acknowledgement.

            “Yeah. She wasn’t sure she could pull it off solo, so we said we’d talk to you,” Sam continued. “That cheered her up a lot, she said something about you being her only hope...”

            “She’s also had a string of very unpleasant dates recently,” Cas put in seriously.

            Dean tapped his leg with the licorice, clearly torn.

            “If I leave now, I can probably wrap things up by tomorrow afternoon,” he said slowly. “But I don’t like the thought of leaving you guys here alone.”

            “Us either, Dean,” Sam said gravely. “I guess we’ll just have to manage, somehow.”

            Dean nodded and stood, his forehead creased with concern.

            “If you need me though, just-”

            “She said to meet at the Blue Mountain Lodge,” Sam added, closing his eyes again. “Hurry back, Dean.”

            “We will miss you,” Cas finished.

            Dean’s self-important, gasoline-scent of determination followed him all the way down the hall. Sam stretched and wriggled back into the massage.

            “That was kind of mean, wasn’t it? It’s a six hour drive.” He yawned. “How long you think it’ll be before he finds out there is no Blue Mountain Lodge in Sioux Falls?”

            “Probably around the same time he remembers Jody is on vacation in the Bahamas and can’t be reached on her phone,” Cas answered calmly, working out a knot on Sam’s upper back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In case anyone is curious, [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3UMMn6oVtOc) is the graham cracker commercial that made Sam cry.


	4. Chapter 4

* * *

 

           Castiel wiped his forehead with the back of his hand and grimaced. It was rare for him to work up perspiration in this form, and the circumstances in which he did were typically either deadly (fighting for his life against some enemy) or…decidedly less so (fornication with Dean). Today, he was forced to add a new category to the list: interior decorating.

            “I don’t like it. I think we should just get another couch, it’d be way more comfortable,” Sam mused, tapping his fingers against his lips and staring down at the trio of squashy armchairs that now faced a corner of the library. Set at an angle within the corner was the television and stand from his room. The very same television and stand that Castiel had now dragged across half a dozen new locations, including the dining room, only to have Sam frown at the set-up as if it were some new species of monster.

            “So we’ll get a couch,” Dean relented easily. “But it’s okay for now, right?”

            “I don’t know, do you mean ‘for now’ like, ‘until we can get to the furniture store later today,’ or ‘for now’ like ‘until we get around to it, in a month or so, when we won’t have time to sit around as much anymore and it doesn’t even matter’?”

            Castiel would have to remember to compliment Dean on his patience. It was no small feat to keep an even temper when he, an angel, was considering abandoning the task at hand and telling the younger Winchester to do some inappropriate things to his own anus.

            “Okay, how about we take the couch from my room and park it here until we get a new one? You cool with that? Cas ‘n me will fix it all up.”

            Then again, Dean’s patience was in part due to the fact that he was mated to a celestial being whose abilities came in very handy in everyday life.

            Castiel may have resented being used for manual labor, but overall he was just pleased that the brothers were getting along again. Appeasing Sam’s nesting instincts was doing something positive for their relationship, it seemed. Dean got to feel useful for lugging every side table, rotating every lamp, freshening every coat of paint, and changing every light bulb his brother asked him to, while Sam finally had a reason to accept Dean’s help, as he had grown to roughly the size and weight of a water buffalo and couldn’t be left to do physical tasks more strenuous than brushing his own teeth.

            Which left Castiel to do the majority of the taxing chores, such as pushing the couch he curled up on most nights from Dean’s bedroom to the new entertainment center, where Dean had already moved the armchairs. He centered the couch in front of the television and Sam sat down immediately.

            “We good?” Dean asked, leaning back against one of the chairs. He looked tired, Castiel noticed. Perhaps the emotional weight of the last thirty-five weeks was catching up to him at last. Or maybe he was just worn out from rearranging all Sam’s bedroom furniture earlier in the morning. (Castiel had certainly found _that_ activity more mentally than physically taxing: after three hours of shuffling, Sam had decided he’d like the Men of Letter’s original configuration best)

            Sam nodded and rubbed at his massive stomach. It was a habit he’d seemed to have picked up unconsciously, as if reassuring himself it was still there.

            “We’re good.”

            “Kay then.” Dean stood, shaking out his arms and cracking his neck. “If anyone needs me to hang a painting or dust the floorboards or drive across three states for their own chuckles, I’ll be out shooting something. Every evil sonofabitch in the world is gonna smell the domestic on me when we get back out there.”

           “We _said_ we were sorry!” Sam grinned, not sounding very sorry at all, but Dean had already waved him off to head down to the shooting range. After helping hoist Sam to his feet (another taxing chore in itself), Castiel followed his mate.

            Dean said nothing as he loaded ammunition into his pistol. His scent was steely-sharp with focus, but the lemon-pine undertone that continued to haunt him anymore still remained. Castiel let him fire off several rounds at the target while he considered this.

            He couldn’t imagine that Sam hadn’t noticed the new, undecipherable scent by now, yet the two of them did not discuss it. Loving and living with Dean was complex at times, and though Castiel wanted to share his suspicions with the person closest to his mate, he could understand Sam’s unwillingness to converse on the subject. There was also the chance Castiel was interpreting the strange emotion all wrong, imagining complexities when there were none.

            And yet…

            “It’s possible Sam could have the child any day now,” he said once Dean stopped to reload. “He is a male Omega, and not a natural-born one at that. There’s only so much space in his womb.”

            Dean didn’t answer, but he didn’t start shooting again either. The pistol tapped rhythmically against the concrete barrier.

            “As demanding as it’s sure to be for us all, I’m glad Sam has chosen to deliver at the bunker,” Castiel continued. “It should be a less traumatic experience for him if he is at home. It’s important for him to feel safe and supported. Especially considering he knows he is to be parted from the life he has grown and nurtured all these months,” he added softly, half-hoping Dean wouldn’t hear him somehow.

            His mate sent him a piercing look.

            “Well, that is the plan, right? He knows it’s his pup but it’s still not really _his,_ and once it’s out, the angels are gonna just bolt down to take it? And we never have to deal with any of this again?”

            “That is the plan,” Castiel confirmed. He felt his wing twitching and was thankful Dean could not see it. Dean’s mouth settled in a grim line, but as he took up his pistol again, Castiel experienced an odd burst of emotion toward his mate and stopped his hand.

            “Dean, I want you to know that I was mistaken to ever feel negatively about having pups of our own. I never meant to hurt you by saying that I did, and the truth is… I’m saddened now, to know that it isn’t an option for us.”

           The words flowed from him without warning, making him surprised at his own candor. Perhaps Sam’s hormones were finally intense enough to affect him.

           “You want to talk about this _now?!”_ Dean’s eyes went wide and he set down the gun. His scent was all cold-sweat fear and rusted-iron panic.

           “Yes. I should have told you months ago, when I knew you were hurting with the pain of it.”

           “Well, there’s nothing to talk about,” Dean said shortly, crossing his arms over his chest. “We can’t have pups, we _shouldn’t_ have pups, and there’s not a damn thing anyone can do about it. It doesn’t even matter.”

           “It does matter, Dean,” Castiel told him gently. “It matters because you wanted this and I hurt you by implying I was glad it wouldn’t happen, when you were already trying to hide from yourself that you’ve longed to be a father.”

           “Cas…” Dean dropped his arms, tensing up like he wanted to fight, but Castiel took the opportunity to grasp his biceps in both hands, bracing himself against his mate.

           “Dean, look at me,” he insisted, forcing the eye contact to happen. After a moment, Dean gazed back miserably. “What _you_ want matters to me, even when you don’t believe it’s in the realm of possibility. It’s okay for you to feel disappointed about this part of our relationship. It’s okay for you to have feelings of sadness about the lives we lead, and it’s okay for you to mourn the loss of the child that’s come closest to being yours. Share your burdens with me, as we’ve already shared so much heartbreak. I have chosen to be your mate, for better or worse, and I have great faith in our ability to manage the worst, together.”

           They collapsed against each other then, embracing fiercely. Castiel felt Dean’s gratitude and love wash over him in waves, from his soul and his scent and his touch. He tried to return the sentiment as best he could, mirroring the enormity of emotion with his hug and the push of his Grace out into his human.

           Dean pulled away and looked at Castiel with a warm, eye-crinkling smile.

           “Dude. That was, like, tooth-rottingly sappy. Next time you wanna get inspirational, dial back the romance novel factor, kay?” But he pressed a kiss to Castiel’s lips that was sweet with thanks and Castiel accepted the gesture with vigor.

          The heavy door swung open suddenly and Sam’s voice cut cross the moment, breathless in awkwardness.

          “Okay, wow, sorry. I was just coming to tell you I made lunch, but if you guys would rather do…whatever, then just…whatever.”

 

           “Bet you were a cute baby, Cas,” Dean commented, dunking his grilled cheese sandwich into a bowl of tomato soup. He’d given in easily to his brother’s call to food, practically inhaling their meal, former melancholy forgotten. Sam snorted from across the table, in amusement or agreement.

           Castiel paused to entertain such a foreign idea. At one time, he knew there had been great mosaics in Heaven of all the angels, celebrating their glory and beauty, but it seemed unlikely that any still existed. He himself had never seen an image of his True form, at any age.

          “I don’t know that angel fledglings have ever been called ‘cute.’ I was hundreds of years old before I fought my first war, but I was still created to be a soldier, to think only of serving God and Heaven. I don’t remember spending much time playing with toys and I was far from helpless, even before I’d grown into my wings.”

          Sam guffawed again and Dean started laughing along with him, the two of them giggling wildly into their bowls. Castiel cocked his head.

          “This is…funny?”

          “Sorry, babe,” Dean smiled. “It’s just, thinking about you as a baby, running around tearin’ crap up with these giant wings flopping everywhere… yep, you were probably on Heaven’s shitlist from day one. And it’s fuckin’ adorable.”

          Castiel had no idea how to respond to this extraordinary pronouncement, so he busied himself serving the brothers more soup and tried not to feel too pleased at his mate’s obvious pride.

           “Do Nephilim have wings?” Sam asked then. “And do they really grow to be giants, like I read in the lore?”

           “No. Nephilim have some measure of Grace, but they cannot fly and their appearance is of normal human size and form. The idea of them as hideous giants is simply more of humans misinterpreting their own ancient texts.”

           “So the one you diced up for Metatron,” Dean paused to slurp more soup. “She just looked like a regular human? No halo, no feathers?”

           “She was very strong and was able to perceive our True forms, but no, I didn’t realize what she was until Metatron told me. She was certainly capable; I suspect she probably led a solitary existence going from one job to the next, trying not to draw attention to herself. Not unlike most Hunters, really.”

           Sam sighed and ran a hand thickly through his hair (which had reached such length that Dean visibly twitched every time his brother and a pair of scissors appeared in his line of sight). He rubbed at his stomach again.

          “Then she’ll be okay, once the angels are done with her. Not… not happy, maybe, but nobody will need to know what she is. She’ll be safe.”

          Sam sounded as if he were trying to reassure himself, but Castiel nodded.

          “She will be able to protect herself, probably even from an early age. And no one but the oldest angels, archangels and Seraphs, will recognize her as Nephilim.”

         He was met with a heavy, intangible stare from Sam and was immediately sure one of his frequent sobbing spells was coming, but the stare melted away into a pensive smile.

         “Thank you, Cas. You’ve helped get me this far, and I don’t know what I would have done without you and Dean.”

 _Redemption,_ Castiel thought to himself. Suddenly it didn’t seem like enough, didn’t seem like anything to reorganize every piece of furniture in the bunker if it made a difference in the journey to bring forth a new life. He’d made the choice to protect humanity, after all, even at the expense of his own kind. He couldn’t forget that this was his opportunity to watch over both.

          Meanwhile Dean, no doubt flustered by two “chick flick moments” in one day, just rolled his eyes and flicked a bread crust at his brother.

         “Yeah, because our first plan was to drop you off at some no-tell motel somewhere until you had the kid, idiot.”

          “You’ve done very well with all this, Sam,” Castiel added. “I know it hasn’t been easy for you, but you’ve met the challenges of bearing this child with great bravery.”

          Something in Sam’s eyes darkened then, and his grip on his belly tightened. He stood to stack his dishes in the sink.

          “No,” he said quietly. “Not all the challenges. Not yet.”

          He left the room without another word.

 

          Castiel expected his mate to sleep soundly that night, especially after Sam had yet another burst of inspiration about the setup of the laundry room, but Dean was restless, tossing and turning for over an hour before dropping off. Without the couch in the room for him to move to, Castiel settled himself at the edge of the bed and meditated quietly, hoping not to disturb him. It was no good. Just as Castiel was considering resting himself, Dean groaned himself awake and sat upright, rubbing the sleep from his eyes and making to leave the bed.

          Castiel glanced at the clock and found it was almost three in the morning.

          “Dean. What are you-”

          “Can’t sleep. Gonna go check on Sam.”

          Too well-versed by now in Dean’s Alpha needs to argue, Castiel merely followed him. Gently, Dean nudged open Sam’s bedroom door, letting the dim lights from the hall catch on his sleeping face.

          Ordinarily, this would certainly be enough to wake the seasoned Hunter, but Sam’s pregnancy exhausted him. He slumbered on, one hand curled up by his face and the other resting on the soft swell of blankets. He smelled of warm-nest coziness and comfort, features more peaceful than Castiel had ever seen.

          He looked from Sam to Dean, who nodded once, apparently satisfied. He eased the door shut and together they stumbled down the hall back to bed.

          Dean fell to his side under the covers, lifting them in invitation to Castiel. He accepted at once and wrapped himself snuggly around Dean’s back, nose buried in the short hairs at the base of his neck. His mate smelled content now, lulling Castiel into a deep sense of relaxation.

          “We’ll get through this, Dean,” he whispered.

          For a bare moment, he wasn’t sure Dean had even heard him, but then that broad body, from muscled shoulders to calloused toes, was sinking back into the heat Castiel offered.

          It was alright. They were fully united once more.

* * *

 

          Clunky footsteps padded in the doorway, making Dean look up immediately.

          “Dude. Go back to bed, you’ve gotta rest up for the big show.”

          Sam just shook his head and walked into the room, hands on his back pushing out his terrifyingly huge belly. Dean didn’t care what Cas said: either there really were two in there or Nephilim really were giants, because it didn’t seem possible that just Winchester genetics were to blame for turning his brother into a small planet.

          “It’s no good. The contractions keep waking me up; they’re coming every twenty minutes now. Besides, it’s already morning. Might as well try to get the show on the road.”

          ‘Morning’ was somewhat debatable, seeing as it was six on the dot, but Dean couldn’t argue that this process was definitely in motion. Since Sam had woken him up a few hours ago, he’d been sitting in the library with his computer, looking for anything at all to distract him from the fact that his little brother was in the early stages of labor. And it was time for the angel-baby reveal, Dean knew. He didn’t need Cas’ confirmation after checking in with the kid or the creeping sense of low-grade panic washing over him to know for sure.

          All he needed was a look at the mixture of fear and awe on Sam’s face and a whiff of his scent in the air. Months of sugary Omega were almost insignificant now with the growing smell of anticipation. Instinctively, Dean placed it as the scent of oncoming birth, rolling and thick with sour cherries and damp moss and warm rain. He was shocked by how much it resembled an Alpha scent, and just as surprised by how much that reassured him.

          “How’re you feeling?”

           Sam lumbered over and fell back against the couch, somehow looking even more huge while sitting.

         “Actually?” He cocked his head the way Cas did. “I’m feeling pretty good about things right now. At peace, I guess, knowing that one way or another, this is about to happen.”

          Dean snorted in disbelief.

          “Really. You feel _at peace_ knowing you have to give birth, to a baby, today.”

           “Okay, well obviously I’m not looking forward to the physical aspect of it all, but I’m talking about, like, the spiritual experience of this.” Sam rested his hands on his belly and looked thoughtful. “It’s hard to explain. I just feel… _good_ about getting the pup to this point. Knowing this thing can grow and live inside me makes me feel like maybe I’m not so toxic anymore. I feel almost purified, in a way the Trials never did for me.”

          Dean nodded, starting to understand what he meant.

          “A fourth Trial. To give out airline tickets to Heaven instead of closing up Hell.”

          “Exactly. It’s like I…”

          Sam trailed off, face screwing up in concentration as his body stiffened. His hands clenched at his stomach in a way that seemed painful before Dean recognized the source of the interruption.

          “Sammy?”

          His brother exhaled shakily and relaxed after a minute. Sam glanced at his watch.

          “Twelve minutes since the last one. This is coming on faster than I expected.”

           He looked worried and Dean felt his Alpha hormones churn in response, telling him to take charge of the situation.

          “Okay. If the pup is in a hurry to get going, freakin’ two and a half weeks early, then we’d better be ready for her. Cas is rounding up towels so you don’t K.O. your mattress with blood and guts, so all you need to focus on is tellin’ me how to make this waiting game more bearable. What do you need? Rest, walking, shower, bowl of cereal?”

           “I’ll try a little breakfast. But I’ll get it, Dean.” Sam started to stand and motioned for him to come over and help. “I feel like I need to be upright, keep moving.”

          Dean clasped his brother’s outstretched hand and pulled hard. Sam stood, swaying to catch his balance for a second before heading for the kitchen.

          “You sure? You don’t wanna, I don’t know, lie down and have us rub your back and feed you candy again? This is the last offer you’re ever gonna get to have me wait on you hand and foot, Sammy.”

          Sam snorted and poured a bowl of cornflakes. He started picking at them dry, not even bothering with milk.

         “I’m sure, but thanks.”

          Dean rolled his tongue around his mouth, thinking.

         “You want me to buzz off and leave you alone?”

          “No,” Sam answered immediately. “You’ve kind of been the gum stuck to my shoe for a while now, but I want you here next to me for this.”

          The Alpha in him pleased, Dean filled his own bowl and was reaching for the sugar when Cas showed up, eyes trained on Sam.

          “How are you feeling? Has there been any progression?”

          Sam crushed a cornflake to dust against the table and shrugged.

           “Nothing really yet.” But even as he spoke, his body clenched up again, taking on another contraction. This time when he resurfaced, his face was white and scared. He reached down gingerly to touch the stupid yoga pants he’d been wearing for two months.

           “Okay. Wow. I’m like _really_ wet now.”

           “Wet?” Dean repeated with barely restrained alarm. Having briefly lost his mind, the next thing from his mouth was, “Wet like how? Like in an Omega way?”

           The bitchface Sam gave him was one for the record books.

          “Yeah Dean, in a sexy, ready-to-fuck way. It’s not from my ass, you moron, it’s my fucking birthing slit!”

          Luckily Cas was there to inject some reason into the vat of crazy the situation had suddenly become. He nudged Sam to his feet with a hand to his shoulder and looked critically at the dark splotch on his pants.

          “We should go elsewhere so I can inspect you. There isn’t much fluid so I think you may have only lost your mucus plug.”

          Trying not to focus on the grossness to come, Dean followed as his mate led his brother to the bathroom and the toilet seat and eased off the pants. He truly, honestly, whole-heartedly did _not_ want to see what was underneath but he figured he owed Sam more grit than that and looked down.

          It wasn’t too bad really, just streaks of clear liquid down his legs, a little blood, but Cas stared at it, frowning.

          “Sam, I believe your water is broken.”

           Sam groaned and buried his head in his hands, closing his legs like it would help to stop the inevitable from coming.

          “It’s just so _soon_. I thought I’d have more time to adjust to it all, hours and hours before it got this far.”

           Dean lingered awkwardly by the door, feeling helpless to comfort him.

          “What do we do now?”

          Cas got down on his knees in front of Sam and gently pried his legs apart before answering.

          “We need to know if Sam is progressing in labor. That is, if his birthing slit is widening up.” He touched the fabric of Sam’s boxers and Sam nodded his consent miserably, face still hidden.

           Dean permitted himself a moment of weakness then and fixed his gaze on a leaky ceiling tile he’d have to get to later. Or maybe sooner than later, maybe today, right now, if it meant he didn’t have to see his mate kneeling between Sam’s legs with his face in his crotch. Dimly, he wondered if he was allowed to start up drinking yet.

           Cas stood and wiped his hands on his t-shirt, which technically still belonged to Dean even though he strongly considered burning it now, AC/DC be damned.

           “The slit is widening. A few centimeters at least. Sam, you may well deliver this child before tonight.”

          Cas handed Sam a towel, which he wrapped around himself tightly, looking self-conscious. He struggled to his feet before he could be offered help and started to leave the room, but when Dean made to follow, he pushed him aside with surprising strength.

          “Don’t.” His voice was cracked and anxious, hair in his face. “Please. Just give me five minutes to myself. I know I said I want you with me, and I do, but I just need a second to process that this is happening.”

           So Dean let him go waddling off with his towel-kilt, desperately hoping that this Trial ended better than the last one.

 

          By late afternoon, Sam’s moans filled the hallways as he walked back and forth slowly, infusing the whole bunker with his increasingly urgent scent. The sound was impossible to ignore, a combination of deep humming and sharp, breathy gasps as the contractions got worse and worse. Sometimes, when the pain seemed almost unbearable, he stopped to grab Dean’s arm or lean weakly against the wall.

          Dean had seen his brother hurt more times than probably even Cas could count, but there was something weird about both the intimacy and, well, _normality_ of this pain that caught him off guard. People did this every single day, he told himself, watching the sweat gather at Sam’s temples and drench the hair he’d loosely wrapped in a ponytail. In a way, bringing in a baby was one of the most pedestrian things the three of them had ever done.

          So the pup happened to be a monster, sort of. So what.

          Cas sat cross-legged on the floor, quiet, but whether he was praying to somebody or just watching, Dean didn’t know. As for himself, he felt better walking along with Sam, helping him to shoulder the contractions that seemed to come all the time now. No one talked much, and hadn’t he always been like this anyway? Better at _showing_ his support for Sam than having anything comforting to say?

           He was about to ask Cas about the time when Sam’s knees buckled hard enough to bring them both down and a dangerous, metallic scent hit the air. Dean yelled his brother’s name and looked from the grimace on his face to the darkness on the carpet, knowing it before seeing it.

          “That’s…a lot of blood,” Sam murmured faintly as Dean and Cas lifted him from under his arms. The red-yellow sticky mess soaked the legs of his boxers and left a trail of droplets as they hurried him into his bedroom, where Cas had stockpiled all the Men of Letters’ old towels and sheets.

          “I’ve seen worse from you, man,” Dean answered, aiming for a reassuring tone. He and Cas dropped Sam at the edge of his bed and Cas pulled off the ruined boxers to check him out again.

          “The next little while will probably be very painful for you, Sam,” he warned, with typical Cas frankness. “I don’t know for certain if you’re dilated fully, but you must be close.”

          Sam gave a slightly hysterical snort.

          “Painful. Right. That’ll be a nice change of pace.”

          He sounded kind of loopy, from either blood loss or pain, but Dean didn’t have the time to dwell on that, not when Sam was groaning his way through a contraction and trying to lower himself to the ground at the same time. Dean and Cas caught him again, and struggled to pull him up to the bed, but Sam grit his teeth and shook his head angrily.

          “Don’t…don’t want to be there,” he panted, sinking to a kneeling position facing the bed, hands grasping the edge of the mattress. “I don’t wanna lay down, this feels better.”

          Cas just nodded and started tucking folded sheets under Sam’s knees, to protect him from the roughness of the carpet and the carpet from everything coming out of him. Dean hovered again, hating himself a little for feeling so useless. He patted Sam’s shoulder uneasily.

          “How you doing, man?”

          Sam grunted and dropped his head to the mattress, muffling his voice.

          “Dean, don’t ask me that again.”

          For a while, nothing much changed, with Sam swearing and moaning under his breath (“Yoga is such _bullshit..._ goddamn Pinterest”), knuckles white where he gripped the bed, Cas at his feet and Dean sitting cross-legged above them. Then there came another big rush of birth-y fluids and Sam made a desperate, sobbing noise that didn’t stop with the contraction.

          “Cas?”

           Dean looked down at his mate, but Cas was already staring back at him, wide-eyed. Castiel, angel of the Lord, freaked. That was not a great sign.

           “I don’t know,” he said quietly, barely audible over Sam’s wailing. The room reeked of his fear and agony, _vinegary bloody lime rind habernero hot steel_. “I think the Nephilim is in position, and I can see…something at the edge of the slit, but he doesn’t seem to be making any progress.”

          “Now is so not the time for ‘I don’t know,’ Cas!” Dean held Sam’s shoulders, trying to soothe him. “You with me, Sammy? You still here?”

          But Sam was beyond words, drawn into his own private circle of Hell where either they didn’t make sense or the pain wouldn’t let him form sentences. Instead he just sobbed incoherently, back arching like he wanted to curl in on himself, and Dean may have had no idea about this whole labor thing, but he knew that if Sam tried to give up, they were well and truly fucked.

           “Can’t you just, I dunno, reach in there and pull it out? _Twilight_ this shit or something?”

           “I don’t think I can interfere without damaging Sam.” Cas looked almost as hopeless as Sam. “I’m sorry, Dean.”

          Fathomless terror bubbling up in his chest, Dean closed his eyes and tilted his head far back. He’d only gotten as far as one single word – _Please_ – before he caught Cas’ soft gasp and that familiar crackle of airwaves and feathers.

           When he opened his eyes, the angel chick who’d turned Sam Omega, Alana, was kneeling alongside Cas.

          “You…!”

          “Yes, I,” she answered distractedly, one hand reaching underneath Sam to feel whatever was going on there and the other pressing hard on his lower back. Sam winced then relaxed a little. His eyes were shut tight but he stopped bawling.

          “He okay?” Dean dared to ask.

          “The infant was moving out of place, which could have proved to be catastrophic. I’ve been watching for some time, hopeful you would not need my assistance – Sam even demonstrated the correct birthing instincts by laboring in a position that allows gravity to counterbalance his narrow pelvis – but the three of you were quickly slipping into panic.”

          Alana pressed down again as Sam started to tremble and cry out, calm like she did this shit every day. Hell, maybe she did, wasn’t that her gig, motherhood? She nodded at Cas.

          “You did well, for as little as you know.”

           It sounded like a slight, but Cas didn’t seem offended, just crawled up beside Dean on the bed with an air of relief at handing off the project.

          “Breathe down into my hand,” Alana directed Sam. “Inhale deep and exhale low, sending oxygen to your child. Open yourself to each contraction. Feel nothing but the cycle of breath and expansion.”

           Against Dean’s side, Cas was murmuring his own quiet encouragements and holding Sam’s hands within his, letting him squeeze hard with that white-knuckled grip. The three of them made a solid chain, steady on both ends to ground the shaking thing in the middle. Dean just tried to follow the slow pattern of breaths, feeling relieved for the intervention.

           And really, really pathetic.

          “You’ve got this one wrapped up, Sam!” He cheered feebly, but he felt the balance of the room crashing down as the stupid words left his tongue. Sam wrenched his head back to glare at him, and he’d never seen his brother look like that before, so furious and exhausted and mindless with pain all at once. He looked _unhinged_.

           “Dean, how about you just take everything you ever want to say in your whole life and shove it all up your fucking ass, okay? Fuck,” he snarled, face contorted with a wave of agony. “ _You,”_ he finished before losing himself to the wave, howling and clenching Cas’ hands so tight that he’d probably be yelling too if he were human.

          Throat dry, Dean glanced from Cas to Alana, who was still kneeling between Sam’s legs, guiding the motions of his body. And okay, they had this one locked in.

          He swallowed hard and found himself moving, getting down off the bed and away from the loud, blood-moist confines of the room and into his own room where it was cool and quiet. There was still a bottle of Jack pushed to the back of his dresser and the feel of the smooth, dusty glass helped to distract his senses as much as the burn of the stuff inside. It was good, but not enough to drive away the sound of Sam’s screams.

           Dean closed his eyes to lean back against the dresser, aware of footsteps and an angry scent that appeared at the door. He took another drink and his throat felt raw now.

          “Needed a break. You guys are doing fine without me. I’m just…no good at seeing him like this, babe, and I don’t think he wants me there anymore anyway.”

          He opened his eyes to find Cas with a look that was equal parts ‘listen up, assbutt’ and pure, unadulterated _doneness_.

          “I didn’t come here to listen to you wallow in self-pity, Dean. Get your ass back to your brother, or I’ll make you.”

          His voice was even gruffer than normal with urgency, and it did something to wake Dean back up to the moment. He frowned at the bottle in his hand, hesitating.

          “But I’m just making it worse. I dunno how to handle this like you guys are, Cas.”

          Cas made an impatient sound, ripped the whisky from him, and slammed it down on the dresser.

          “The Dean Winchester I’ve devoted my life to cares more for his pack than anyone else on Earth. Sam needs you right now, and insults or not, you _will_ be there to support him. I won’t let this be another regret for you.”

           Cas seized his arm and dragged him back down the hall with inhuman strength, both of them landing headfirst in the fray. From the doorway, it almost looked like Sam was praying, with his body curved over and his hands clasped at the bed. But up close, he had the expression of someone being tortured, someone who’d lost hope of there ever coming an end.

          “D-Dean?”

           He looked right through Dean as he and Cas arranged themselves back on the bed, eyes wet and glassy. His t-shirt stuck damply to his shoulders and back. Loose strands of his sweaty hair stuck to his face and his lips were dry and bloodless.

          His brother was suffering bad, and suddenly Dean’s mind felt clear. He took up Sam’s hand, leaving Cas to grasp the other one, caught his aimless gaze, and told him with as much confidence as he could muster, “You can do this, Sammy, c’mon. Time to light this rocket.”

          Sam nodded vaguely, mouth open slightly before his jaw clenched against a guttural noise (that made Dean briefly wonder where Crowley was as his brother really did sound like a moose). His face flushed red as he weathered another spasm, and from down below, Alana rubbed circles against his back, eyes never leaving the action zone.

          “The head is nearly out,” she told Dean unexpectedly, and he felt a jolt in his stomach. “Bear down, Sam. Breathe. Breathe. And push!”

           Sam grunted and clutched hard at Dean’s hand, shaking the whole damn bed.

          “That’s it, Sammy, you’re doing good. Just a little more and we’re home free, ‘kay? You’re almost there, don’t quit on me now, almost there…”

           He trailed off as Sam started to build again, and something in his body posture and scent told Dean that this push would be the last. He leaned forward on the bed, holding Sam’s clammy hand, barely hearing his cries or anything else in the room over the blood pounding in his own ears.

           Sam threw his head back and screamed, every muscle fiery raw, but he looked so powerful in that moment, burning and alive and rippling with purpose, and Dean could only just keep him anchored to the world, feeling as insignificant as an ant under an archangel.

           And then, God, there was something in Alana’s arms, covered in blood and who the fuck even knew what else and it was alive too and wiggling around. Then it was crying, louder even than Sam, and that was good, great, amazing actually, the most incredible sound in the world.

           Sam collapsed against the edge of the bed with a quiet whisper for only himself, and somehow the loss of contact with him was what told Dean it was over.

           He shook his aching head, not quite believing it could be true, after all these months of waiting, but the thing was still here, squirming against Alana as she toweled it off and looked it over. Cas was helping Sam to crawl up on the bed, where he settled against his pillow with a soul-deep sigh of exhaustion, which left Dean to inspect the new little life.

           It looked wholly human, with pinkish skin and curls of dark brown hair. Ten fingers. Ten toes. Zero wings. And – he couldn’t help but notice and it made him smile for what felt like the first time in a long time – Sam was right all along. It was a girl.

           Alana wrapped her in a clean sheet, evidently satisfied.

          “Health is good, no apparent deformities or irregularities. Twenty one inches long, nine pounds even.”

          Dean guessed that was about it then, but instead of zapping off into the void, Alana hesitated before offering up the bundle to Sam with a strained expression.

          Sam’s brow scrunched in confusion.

          “Why?” he asked slowly, voice totally wrecked with overuse. “Shouldn’t you take her back up top now, to Seraphiel and friends?”

          “Seraphiel and I will be down again shortly,” Alana answered, still holding out the pup with something like insistence. “For now…you should have her close to you.”

          “I don’t know if that’s such a good-” Sam started, but Alana had already flown off, leaving him with an armful of newborn Nephilim.

          Dean and Cas bracketed him and the three of them stared down at the creature that had fallen quiet and now just wriggled in her bundle. She squinted back at them. Her eyes were a slightly greener hazel than Sam’s but the very same shape.

          “She doesn’t _look_ like an abomination,” Dean said finally. “She’d be kind of cute if she wasn’t all squishy-ish.”

          “That’s only because she’s brand-new,” Sam murmured absentmindedly. “But why didn’t Alana just take her? Cas? What’s going on here?”

          Cas didn’t lift his eyes from the baby as he answered, “I don’t know what the Seraphs have planned. Maybe it’s nothing, just a misunderstanding of who is meant to take charge of her.”

          He looked up then and gave Sam a tired smile.

          “But at any rate, congratulations on a successful labor and delivery. You did an excellent job, Sam.”

          Dean clapped his brother on the shoulder and nodded his agreement.

          “What he said. You did real good, Sammy. That was a goddamn horrorshow to get through, but I’m proud of you, for hanging in there.”

           Sam let his eyes fall shut, looking pleased but beat. He curled the pup a little closer to his chest and sighed again.

          "So now you're here. We made it through that part, anyway. What're they going to do with you, little one?"

* * *

 

           Sam’s head pounded so hard his eyes hurt. His throat was sand-papery rough and his knees and thighs ached and cramped from kneeling so long. Wet strands of hair stuck to his neck. Everything between his legs was a sore, sticky, disgusting mess. All in all, he felt like he’d gone three hundred years in Hell then been used as a piñata at a demon birthday party. It hurt to even think about moving, and yet, he couldn’t give a single fuck about the pain.

           The world had shrunk, suddenly. Nothing much mattered: Dean, Cas, the angels, even the carnage of birth were all inconsequential.

           At first he’d thought he was delirious with relief over being done, but once Alana handed her over to him, he realized that wasn’t the case at all. He wasn’t just happy because his pregnancy was over. He was overjoyed because _she was here_.

           This was really her, so tiny and perfect, to lay warm in his arms and snuffle quietly. Every one of her breaths was a miracle, more important than all the battles and wars he’d ever fought. The sight of her wrinkled little face was a gift he knew he couldn’t deserve but accepted anyway, savored with a calmness and joy he hadn’t suspected even existed in himself.

           Sam wanted to laugh and cry and scream all at the same time. It wasn’t possible to feel so much at once without a detonation; at any second, he knew he was going to spill over and crash into Dean, who paced restlessly, or the quiet, thoughtful form of Cas at his feet. He was shocked they hadn’t noticed the earth shifting, coming alive with the beauty of her. The soft little weight against his chest felt like an answer, felt like _the_ answer, and that answer was _yes_.

           Dean tossed his head back and grumbled, cutting across the humid, earthy air with his frustration.

          “Twenty minutes? Fucking really? What’s taking so long? We held up our end of the deal and now it’s time for them to come and collect on it.”

          Cas sighed.

          “Patience, Dean. I’m sure it won’t be much longer.”

          Dean’s face darkened like he wanted to argue just for the sake of arguing, but he went still suddenly. Cas slid off the bed, looking wary, just as Sam finally noticed that particular crackle of energy in the air. The pup awoke at the noise and light and started to cry fretfully, commanding all his attention for a minute. He rubbed her back and smoothed her tiny curls of hair, and the motions came to him naturally, like he’d known how to do this all along.

          Once she’d calmed down, he looked up into the face of the short, pissy angel leader, Seraphiel. Her eyebrows and mouth were pinched, and the other angel, Alana kept glancing at her fearfully. No one said anything; even Dean was reduced to quietly seething from the corner.

          But Sam just stared back. He wasn’t afraid of her, wasn’t afraid of anything just then.

          “It seems congratulations are in order,” Seraphiel whispered. “Alana tells me the Nephilim is healthy, and I can see you survived to deliver it. You should be proud.”

          She looked down at the baby, with an expression of undisguised loathing, and all at once the haze around Sam evaporated. Without thinking, he wrapped himself more tightly around her and heard a low growl sound from between his teeth.

           He wasn’t stupid. He knew they were here to take her, but that didn’t matter, because Sam knew, beyond even a shadow of a doubt, that he _would_ kill anyone that tried. Angel, demon, or anything in between.

           Seraphiel drew back and crossed her arms over her chest, but the gesture was forced, unnatural.

          “As I recall, you Winchesters were not ones for tact, so I know you will forgive me for going straight to the point,” she continued. She looked down at the pup once again, and Sam wanted to destroy her just for having the audacity.

          “We have abandoned the effort to wield a counterspell to Metatron’s curse. Accordingly, we now have no use for the Nephilim.”

          Seraphiel spoke simply, like every word was being fed to her from a teleprompter. It didn’t mean anything to her, but Sam felt a kind of dizzying sensation warming at his heart. He understood, instantly, that he really did have nothing to fear, even though no one else seemed to have gotten the message.

          Cas’ mouth was open as he looked at Seraphiel, frozen where he stood. Alana stared at the wall, avoiding eye contact with anyone. And Dean blazed, fists drawn, chest heaving, radiating cinnamon fury as he roared, “ _What?!”_

          “My Seraphs and I have decided to pursue other means for reclaiming the angels on Earth. We will not be taking the Nephilim with us to Heaven,” Seraphiel recapped, looking bored, but Dean shook his head rapidly.

          “That’s not how this fucking works, you flying ass-monkeys! You can’t just _decide_ to breed a Nephilim and put my brother through months of hell and then go, Oh, never mind. You think she’s a fucking turtle or some shit, something you can just hand off because you don’t want it anymore? This is _that_ meaningless to you?!”

          “I apologize,” Alana whispered quickly, still not looking at anyone. Dean slapped the dresser top and glared at her instead.

          “That’s not good enough and you damn well better know it! You were there today, you really think a little ‘sorry’ is gonna cut it for what you’ve put Sam through? Fuck no. Now riddle me this, O Great Dicks of the Heavens. The pup is already here; what are we supposed to do with her now?”

          Sam wished his brother would shut up. His shouting was upsetting the baby and it meant nothing, did nothing on Sam’s behalf. He wanted to explain, to tell Dean why his indignation was wasted but Seraphiel was making another disgusted expression, this time at Dean.

           “It is of no concern of mine.”

           Dean stared back blankly, stunned into a silence she seemed to take for acceptance because she nodded impatiently at Alana and said, “You may restore Sam’s breed status, and we will be on our way.”

          Alana’s small hands touched down at Sam’s forehead and chest, sending an electrifying wave of light that momentarily blinded him. When he blinked back into himself, he was clean and free from all pain and exhaustion. He could breathe easily, with the weight of his belly gone, and he could feel that everything beneath his fresh pajama bottoms had been returned to factory settings. Briefly, he lamented that the pup had only his flat, hard chest to curl up against now, but he could see that Seraphiel meant to leave and another revelation came to him.

           “Wait.”

           Three sets of eyes watched as Sam pushed himself upright in bed, having caught Seraphiel’s attention. His hands wavered, but he’d made up his mind, and held the baby – the most important little life to ever come into existence – out to her mother.

            Seraphiel recoiled like she’d seen a dead mouse.

           “What are you doing?” she hissed.

           “Giving you a chance to see the kid you helped create, before you leave her forever,” Sam answered. He felt emboldened, but not cruel: he really did want to give Seraphiel the opportunity to hold their baby. There had to be some part of her that was interested in touching what they had made together, maybe unwillingly, but with the final product no less beautiful for it.

           Yet if there was, Seraphiel had buried it deep, deep within herself. She didn’t speak again, just curled her lip and scowled, the first look to seem like it really belonged on her borrowed face. It was an expression of unspeakable hatred, sure, but also of fear. She only ever was a desperate queen on an empty throne, Sam knew, and then she was gone.

           Sam sighed, relaxing now that he and his pack were finally alone. As far as he was concerned, the excitement was over, but Dean obviously had other ideas.

          “ _You guys_. What the fuck just happened here?”

          His silence broke with a wood smoke anger scent as he looked from Sam to Cas, who’d dropped to the floor with his back to the door, knees curled up to his chest. He looked as drained as Sam had ever seen him, though this clearly meant little to his mate at the moment.

          “Cas?” Dean’s voice went quieter. “You knew, didn’t you?”

          At first Sam didn’t think he was going to answer, but then Cas nodded once.

          “I suspected. Since meeting Jehoel. Suspected that the counterspell was no longer a route being considered by the Seraphs. I said nothing because it was too late to do anything, Sam was too far along, and I hoped I was wrong.”

          “That was months ago! You mean to say that Heaven’s douche squad gave up on Sam and the pup and this plan all the way back then?”

           Cas hesitated, hands curved stiffly on his knees.

           “Probably sooner. Maybe even before Jehoel began his mercy killings; his faith in Seraphiel was completely lost by the time I caught up to him.”

            Dean looked so agonized Sam was starting to worry for him. He’d thought the path in front of them was obvious, that there could be only one way from here, but clearly his brother hadn’t caught on yet.

           “Dean. It’s okay. It doesn’t matter anymore. The angels are gone and they aren’t coming back. It’s not important what they think or did.”

           “Sammy, how can you _say_ that?” Dean groaned, bracing himself against the dresser. “Of course it matters, we’ve got a fucking huge problem on our hands! A problem with green eyes and chubby cheeks and nowhere to go now.”

           Sam breathed, trying to infuse the tense atmosphere with his newfound sense of calm. There was a scent he didn’t recognize in the air, a complex scent layered richly with pinewood and softened by notes of warmth on a summer night and river moss.

           He looked his brother square in the eye.

          “She’s not a problem, Dean, and she’s not going anywhere. I’m keeping her.”

          To his credit, Dean had the guts to look terrified at first. His eyes widened, his mouth dropped, and Sam could practically see the wheels going in his head, taking in all that this would entail and being scared shitless by the prospect. For a moment, he let himself just believe Sam, accept without question, because he’d always wanted to give his brother the world and because he wanted this too. Sam knew. Dean didn’t have to communicate his love or devotion with words, didn’t have to tell him or Cas how he felt, not when his true feelings always came through, and this was no different.

          Except this time Sam hadn’t known he’d felt the same, wanted this – _needed her_ – so desperately, achingly. Not until now.

          “Sam…” Dean managed weakly, staring into him like he wasn’t sure he’d heard right, falling back into his old stand-by of denial. “You can’t.”

           There was yet another rustling of immaterial feathers and when Sam looked to the door, Cas had vanished. The carpet there was stained, he noticed, dotted with little bits of blood from earlier. Well. It probably wasn’t the first time the bunker had seen blood; they’d get it out later.

          “I can. And I will, I _want_ this, Dean. I think…” he trailed off, gazing down at the baby’s ( _his_ baby’s) small face. “I think it was always meant to be like this. This is just what I’m supposed to do now, I can feel it.”

          “We’re _Hunters,_ Sam!” Dean sat at the edge of the bed, gesturing between the two of them. “We don’t get to have kids! Look at us! Look at how we grew up, shuffled from town to town, no friends, no money, trying not to get our faces eaten off at night and holding onto the hope that Dad would make it back in the morning! Is that what you want for her?”

          “I would _never_ do what Dad did to us.” The words were savage in his throat, burning him with a hatred he’d never been able to express before. But now, with his own innocent life to protect, his choice couldn’t be simpler. “Because I’m giving up Hunting.”

          “ _What?!”_ Dean stared again, this time like he’d heard perfectly well and wished he hadn’t.

          “I’m not going to Hunt anymore. I’m getting out.” The idea seemed to come together as he spoke; Sam actually felt flushed with relief to hear it himself. “We’re going to stay here in the bunker while she’s little and you two can help look after her, but I’m going back to school. Once I get my law degree, I’m finding us a house, in the suburbs, where she can walk to school and play with other kids and ride a bike and be in the science fair and never have to worry about her dad making it back in the morning.”

          “I don’t believe this,” Dean said hoarsely, rubbing his bloodshot eyes. “Yesterday, everything was going to be back to normal by tonight, and now you’re raising a kid and quitting Hunting? You’re just gonna up and _leave?”_

          The pup squirmed in her wrappings (Sam guessed she was probably getting hungry) and he resettled her against him before reaching out to rest his hand on Dean’s shoulder. He exhaled deeply and the warm, pinewood scent intensified.

          “I’m not leaving, Dean. Not now, anyway. And I’ll never be done with our world completely, it’s in my blood. But for long term, I’m thinking more along the lines of Man of Letters. Doing research. Answering phones. Leaving the monster slaying to her uncles so you can load her up with nightmare fodder when you come to visit.”

          Dean snorted, face flickering with light for a moment.

          “Uncles,” he repeated softly. “Guess that’s me now, an uncle to somebody.”

          “An uncle to _this_ somebody,” Sam told him. Gently, he lifted the little bundle and pressed her into Dean’s arms.

          The faces they had for each other were almost identical: scrunched eyebrows, wide-open green eyes, a confused gather to their mouths, and it just helped to reaffirm for Sam that yes, she was theirs, and yes, she belonged here.

         “She’s amazing, isn’t she? The most amazing thing you’ve ever seen?”

          Dean nodded slowly, face evening out to something like awe.

          “Yeah.” He swallowed and brought her close to his chest. “Alright, you win. Both of you.”

          Sam stretched his arms overhead, cracking his not-so-stiff-anymore back and smiled. He could be happy now, satisfied that Dean finally understood.

          “So, what’re we gonna call the little abomination?”

           “You know, that’s fitting, isn’t it? An abomination born of an abomination. Maybe Heaven has a sense of humor after all,” Sam mused. He looked at them both, his brother and his daughter, and the strange serenity of the night unfolded one more step for him.

          “Mary. Her name is Mary Winchester.”

          Dean closed his eyes for a beat, and Sam was almost afraid this was too much for him. But then he smiled, open and honest, like he’d known all along.

          “Mary, then. That’s a helluva namesake, little lady. You better make your old Uncle Dean proud,” he crooned to his niece, scent gooey with sweetness, and Sam held in a laugh. For a moment, he let himself imagine a future where there were juice boxes in the fridge by the beer, and cartoon music playing in the Impala, and tiny socks stuck to plaid flannel in the laundry, and his throat ached so much with the thought of it all that he barely noticed Cas’ reappearance in the room.

           The angel was laden down with mountains of stuff, pink plastic bags, diapers, a car seat. He started to unload onesies and formula, not looking at all surprised to find Dean holding the baby.

           “Lemme guess,” Dean snorted. “You _suspected_ that diaper changes were in our future.”

           “No, I knew. From the moment Sam held the child, he chose her as his own, just as Alana hoped, I’m sure. But I did think you might need some time to come around to the idea.” Cas settled himself on the bed and joined his mate in watching Mary’s tiny movements and sighs.

            Dean huffed softly.

           “Doesn’t it ever get old, Cas, knowing everything all the time? Don’t you get bored of us squashy meatbags and our short, predictable lives?”

           “The two of you surprise me constantly,” Cas answered quietly, laying a hand on Mary’s forehead. She gave a sleepy hum that all but shattered Sam’s heart. “I could never grow tired of following your lives, joining your fights, seeing your victories large and small. I would think raising a child will come as a much more pleasant challenge than closing the gates of Hell.”

           “Well, we’re off to a good start anyway. She’s been on this dumb hunk of rock an hour and she’s already scared off the angels. That’s my kind of kid. Plus she’s got Sam here smelling like a dad, so I guess he’s ready.”

           Sam looked up at that and found Dean with a smirk as dopey as his scent.

          “Is that me?”

          “ ‘Course it is. All happy, hard-ass Alpha, like you’re about to either rip out someone’s lungs or break into song. That’s you, Daddy.”

          “Huh. Alright then.” Sam started grinning too, feeling so alive with possibility it was like he’d been reborn into the world himself. “Gimme back my pup, Uncle Dean, and let’s figure out how to mix up formula. Then you should hit the hay. It’s been a long day and you look like shit.”

          “Like hell I’m going anywhere,” Dean answered stubbornly. Reluctantly, he passed back Mary. “And who freakin’ gave birth an hour ago, me or you? Just because the angels prettied _you_ up-”

          “I’ll get the formula,” Cas broke in. “And watch over her if either of you drop off in the night.”

          “Then _I’ll_ get the formula. If we’re gonna be Three Men and a Baby, and you get to have her all night, I’m pulling my weight in the feeding department.” Dean snatched the can from his mate’s hands and pressed a kiss to his forehead as they clambered off the bed, the two of them smiling and bumping into each other playfully when they finally left the room. Dean's scent of crisp-apple reassurance and love trailed them down the hall.

         Sam and Mary were alone then. He traced her small hand with his thumb, breathing in her warm, undefined baby scent.

         “It’s always like this. There’s lots of arguing and monsters and late nights, but you’re welcome to it all. And I’m going to give you so much more than that. We may not know what we’re doing all the time, but I promise you we’ll do our best to make sure you’re safe and loved and you never get left behind at a sleazy motel.”

         He laughed quietly.

         “Anyway, you’ll be the most well-protected kid in the world, living here. Try to go easy on Dean, okay? He means well, and he already loves you too. We’ll figure everything out, in time. I think we’re all just glad that you’re here.”

         She waved one tiny fist and for a moment, Sam again felt the vibration he’d come to know for so long, the miniscule sparkle of her Grace.

         “This is your pack, Mary. You’re home.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! I had so much fun putting this story together, I'm sad it's come to an end.  
> (So let's all take a minute to think about Dean buying little classic rock onesies and ignoring Sam's instructions about organic baby food to feed his niece Oreos and Cas spending long nights walking the bunker, soothing her colic and telling her about the history of angels, and Sam coming home to a house with a white-picket fence and a dog and sticky toddler hugs, crayon drawings on the fridge and a book of lore next to his burner phone, and ARGH, stop me now! In my world, there are only happy endings for Team Free Will.)


End file.
